Desires of Deepest Red II (Touhou Fan Fiction)
by TheOVJM
Summary: If you haven't read the first part, please do before reading this! Four weeks have passed. Everything has returned to as normal as it possibly can... or has it? Flandre, the sister of the Devil, isn't happy about what happened and has decided to 'fix' everything, but how is she planning to do that. With the help of two humans, she starts yet another adventure. Will it end well?
**Desires of Deepest Red II**

"Any luck with Flandre?" Remilia asked from Sakuya who had just returned from the basement.

"No milady... sigh* Not even a slightest sound. She really got depressed after Marisa's death." Sakuya responded with sad look on her face.

"Sigh* We have tried everything. Why can't she just get over with it? Marisa was the villain after all." Remilia bridled and turned around.

Three weeks had passed since Flandre had visited Marisa's grave and after she returned, she shut herself to the basement. Every person within the Scarlet Devil Mansion had tried to get her to come out but with no results. Everyone in Gensokyo were really sad about it all. None could ever forget the events that happened a month ago. Many humans and youkai had asked from Yukari that whether or not Reimu could be brought back, but Yukari had rejected every request to revive Reimu.

"Some things must reamin buried..." Yukari had answered the last time when some humans came from the human village and asked if Reimu could be revived. Yukari never said that it would be impossible, she just rejected everyone who wanted to bring Reimu back to life, with some cryptic sentence like: "Death is a harsh mistress..." or "When cycle of life ends, it cannot be rewinded..."

No one knew what she meant with those phrases, but she made really clear that she would not allow to bring back anyone who died during the incident. Not even Reimu.

It took only few days after Marisa's death until every magical item from her home had been taken back by their original owners. Everyone were happy to finally get their belongings back and none of them showed any compassion towards Marisa when emptying her house. It actually seemed that no one else but Flandre and Keine, really cared what had happened to Marisa. But there still was a third one. An eight years old boy in the human village called Yana was really heart broken after the death of Reimu and Marisa. He had always admired them and wanted to become youkai hunter like them someday, so after his idols died, he was really sad. Currently he was in Keine's history lesson like every other kid in the human village. Keine was talking something about some spring snow incident that happened in 2004. It really didn't interest Yana at all. He very well knew already what happened back then. How Reimu, Marisa and Sakuya had together travelled to netherworld, defeated Yuomu and Yuyuko there and ended the everlasting winter. Yana had not even born when it happened, but he still knew every adventure that Marisa and Reimu had gone through.

"Why can't Yukari just bring them back?" He thought to himself while drawing something to a piece of paper.

"Okay everyone, that's it for today. The school day is over." Keine said after looking at the clock. All students backed their things and headed out of the class. Everyone except Yana. He was so concentrated on his drawing that he didn't notice that the school had ended. Keine noticed him. She was wondering why he didn't leave like the other kids.

"Why are you still here? Shouldn't you return home?" Keine asked from Yana.

"Wh-ohh, sorry. Didn't notice that the lesson ended." Yana said when he woke up back to reality.

"Something on your mind or why have you been so distant lately?" Keine asked from Yana. She had noticed that Yana had been acting weirdly lately.

"Well, I've been just thinking; why Yukari doesn't allow to revive Reimu. She was a hero and heroes always return, don't they?" Yana explained to Keine. Keine looked at Yana with sad look on her face, sighed and said: "I understand how you feel. I too would like to see Reimu again, but I also know that Yukari doesn't mean to be evil. She knows what's best for us and everyone."

"But Reimu has saved Gensokyo so many times. Couldn't she make an exception just this once?" Yana insisted.

"Look, you should go home. I bet that your parents are wondering where are you." Keine responded. Yana just sighed, backed his things and walked outside. It was 4 pm. His family was going to eat soon so he decided to hurry back home. He just couldn't understand why Yukari couldn't revive Reimu.

"What's the worst thing that could happen? Not that she is going to kill us all." He thought to himself while walking home. Yana actually thought that Marisa should be revived too. Even if Marisa was the villain, she too had saved Gensokyo many times before and deserved a second change. Many other beings, especially humans didn't think that way and Yana just didn't understand why.

He soon arrived home. He smelled freshly cooked food. It was definetly the best thing that one could smell, there was no doubt about that.

"What took you so long? Something happened in school?" Yana heard his mother asking from the kitchen.

"Just talked with teacher before leaving." Yana answered, took his shoes off and walked to kitchen.

"What were you two talking about?" His mother asked. Yana walked to kitchen and sat down on to a chair.

"What's your opinion about: should we resurrect Reimu or not?" Yana asked with curious look on his face.

"What's that supposed to mean?" His mother asked.

"Well, that's the topic me and Keine were talking about." Yana answered to his mother.

"Well, I don't have strong opinions about that, but I trust Yukari and believe that she knows what she's talking about." Yana's mother answered and brought Yana some food.

"Come on, you too? They have done so much for us. Shouldn't we do something for them now?" Yana insisted when he heard that even his mother really didn't want to revive Reimu.

"What do you mean by 'them'?" Yana's mother asked with confused tone and sat before Yana.

"Reimu and Marisa. They are the heroes of Gensokyo." Yana answered with sparkling eyes.

"Marisa? You would want to revive that monster?" Yana's mother asked with surprised and a bit disgusted look on her face.

"She has done so much for us. She deserves a second change." Yana answered and tried to change his mother's opinion, but his mother didn't warm up for the idea that Marisa should be revived too.

"I understand that you would like to revive Reimu, we all do, but to revive Marisa too? Don't let your father catch you saying that. You know that he has strong opinions when it comes to youkai." Yana's mother said and sighed. Yana thought that it was hopeless. No one understood his point. He just quickly ate the rest of his food and went to his room. He shut the door behind him, walked to his table, opened his drawer and started to look for something.

"I know I have it somewhere in here. If no one else is able to get Yukari to get them back, then I will talk to her myself." He muttered to himself. After a while he finally pulled a small piece of paper out from the drawer.

"Ah-hah! I created this plan about 5 days ago. With this I should be able to sneak out from the human village and get to the Hakurei shrine to talk with Yukari." Yana thought to himself and put the pece of paper to his pocket. It needed to be night till he could implement his plan, so he just needed to wait. Suddenly he heard how his father returned home. Yana's father was a good man, but very, very sceptical and hostile when it came to youkai and other non humans. He was very relieved when Yukari and the others were able to take Marisa down. Yana never understood why his father had so deep hatred towards youkai, but he just needed to live with it.

"What my father thinks about youkai, wont stop me from trying to get Yukari to change her mind." Yana thought to himself. And started to think about how he was going to execute hes plan without getting caught.

After waiting for five boring hours, Yana thought that he should get few hours of sleep before setting out. It was going to be tiring walk so it seemed reasonable. He quickly changed his clothes and went to sleep. He was quite sure that he could wake up before morning, so he could sneak out. It didn't take long until he fell asleep.

"Yaaawn* Uhh... What's the clock?" Yana thought to himself when he finally woke up. He had a pleasant dream. In the dream he was being teached by Reimu to become a youkai hunter. He really hoped that it would become reality some day. He stood up from his bed and looked at the clock.

"Huh? Is it 3 am already? I have to hurry!" He thought to himself, got dressed up as quickly and quietly as possible and then slowly opened the door of his room. Completely quiet. It seemed that everyone was sleeping. Yana tried to sneak as quitly as possible to the kitchen. When he got there, he checked the cupboard. He grabbed a few peces of bread and little bit of ham. He would need a little bit food on his way to the Hakurei shrine. The journey wouldn't be too long, but because it was night, it would take him a quite some time to get there. He was lucky. His family usually didn't have bread because it wasn't too common food within Gensokyo, but they happened to have some this time. He wrapped them into some paper and put them into his backpack. He then proceeded to walk to the front door and opened it. He looked around himself. There was no one on the streets but there were few houses that had light shining in their windows.

"I'll just avoid walking too close to those houses." Yana thought to himself and started to walk along the street leading out of the village. It wasn't long till he arrived to the east gate of the village. He looked around himself: there was no one else but one guard standing near the gate for in case of any youkai. This was the greatest obstacle that Yana had to get pass, but he had a plan. He grabbed a fairly big stone from the ground and sneaked towards the nearby pig corral. He looked around himself to be sure that he would not be noticed. When he was sure that there was nobody nearby, he threw the stone at one of the sleeping pigs. It woke up and started to run around aimlesly and squealed while doing so. It almost immediately startled all other pigs and almost half of the village. Yana then quickly returned to the gate. It seemed that his plan had worked. The guard was nowhere to be seen. It seemed that the sound of the pigs had cought the guards attention and he had went to investigate the situation. This was Yana's change, so he started running as fast as he could before anyone would notice him.

Yana ran for over minute along the road leading to the Hakurei shrine before he stopped. He was panting heavily. He looked around himself to be sure that no one was following him. Then he realized how dark and silent it was. There was no sound of the wind. Only thing that he could hear was the sound of crickets. Yana knew that most of the fairies were sleeping during this time so they wouldn't be threat for him, but Yana very well knew that there would be much more scarier and more dangerous beings than fairies. Yana gulped and started to walk along side the road. He was walking as far away from the middle of the road as possible, so he would be harder to notice. He was looking around himself all the time, but the darkness made it really hard to see very far.

"Maybe I should have brought a lantern with me? No, no, I would be noticed immediately if I had light source with me." Yana thought to himself. Even if light source seemed like a bad idea, it still would have made him feel even a bit more comfortable.

"What am I going to do if youkai spots me? Yana was thinking for himself.

"Should I just run? Or hide?" Yana kept thinking. He had never ever seen a real youkai, so he had no idea how he was going to save himself if he was spotted by one. Yana just tried to stay as positive as possible. Maybe if he was spotted, he should scream for help. Maybe someone like Mokou or some nice youkai would hear his scream.

It was long and tiring walk. After walking for one hour Yana had no idea if he was even close to the Hakurei shrine. He was just hoping that he would reach it soon, the darkness was starting to make him really nervous. He felt that at any given moment there could be a random youkai dashing at him from the forest. Yana gulped when he thought about what could possibly happen to him if he happened to come across any youkai. Yana kept on walking, but suddenly he stopped. In the middle of the road, in front of him there was standing someone. It looked like a little girl somwhere around his age. The girl was wearing a dark red dress with long white sleeves. She had a strange hat that held the same color as her dress. It looked like she had a dark pink semi long hair. The girl just looked at Yana with confused look on her face and tilted her head.

"Uhmm... Who might you be?" Yana asked after hesitating for a moment. The girl stayed silent for moment and just watched Yana. Then she took a one step closer to take a better look at the boy in front of her.

"You are not youkai, are you?" The girl asked after looking at Yana for while.

"N-no I'm not. Y-you wouldn't happen to be youkai yorself, would you?" Yana answered with a bit frightened tone.

"Ah, indeed I am. And it seems that we have little lost lamb here too. What a tasty coincidence. Oh, but let me introduce myself. I'm Mystia Lorelei, the singing night sparrow and it seems that I'm going to have a banquet this night." Mystia said with sinister tone and grinned. She then showed her hands which had fingers with long, green and sharp nails. She licked her lips as she started slowly walking towards Yana. Yana quickly understood what was coming for him if he didn't escape at this exact moment. He quickly turned 90 degrees to his left and started running as fast as he possibly could. Mystia just cracked amused smile, extended her wings that contained white feathers and took off from the ground and started to follow Yana.

"Why so big haste. Why wouldn't you introduce yourself to me? It would be nice to know the name of one's pray." Mystia taunted Yana while flying above him. Yana kept on running and screamed for help. The forest was really dense and it was really hard to run, but it didn't seem that Mystia would have any hard time keeping up with screaming Yana.

After running for minute or two Yana came across a huge cliff that was overlooking a small pond. It was too high, so Yana had to stop. He was panting heavily as he was looking for way to escape. Mystia just slowly descended to the ground behind Yana and smiled sinisterly.

"Going out alone in the middle of the night? What were you expecting to happen?" Mystia taunted Yana while slowly walking closer to him.

"HELP! SOMEONE!" Yana screamed and sarted to panic.

"Stay away from me!" Yana shouted at Mystia. Mystia chuckled a bit and answered: "Or what? You going to tickle me?" Mystia took a few steps closer and readied herself. But then, out of nowhere, Yana heard a faint buzzing sound and then multiple blue beams hit Mystia. Mystia groaned as the beams hit her and Yana saw how some dark figure tackled Mystia in high speed. Yana was so surprised that he accidentally took a step backwards. This was a mistake because he stumbled and fell off from the cliff.

"AAAAAHHH" Yana screamed as he fell. The dark unknown figure quickly turned around and headed towards falling Yana. Just before Yana was about to hit the rocky pond, he felt how he was grabbed by someone. Yana felt how they were moving in high speed and he clinged on to the figure holding him. Yana was too shocked that he couldn't utter even a single word but he realized that he was saved.

After twenty seconds, the figure holding Yana started to slow down and they landed on to small opening in the forest. The unknown person finally let go of Yana and as soon as he touched the ground he turned around to see who saved him.

It was a girl. She too looked like young somewhere around ten years old. She had blonde semi long hair and red charm tied to the left side of her hair. She had a black vest, skirt and white blouse with red tie bordered by two large red beads around her neck. There was spittle dripping from the girls mouth as she watched Yana. Yana didn't care who the girl was. Only thing he knew was that he owed his life to that girl.

"Thank you!" Yana yelled as he hugged the girl in front of him. The girl's eyes spread wide open when Yana hugged her. She too had long sharp claws but Yana didn't seem to notice that.

"Uhmmm... What are you doing?" The girl asked with confused tone. Yana let go and looked at the girl and smiled at her. He then took the backpack from his back and started to search for something.

"Where is it...? Ah, here! I know that this isn't much, but it's the least I can give to you for saving my life." Yana said while holding few pieces of bread and ham in his hands. The girl was still looking at Yana with confused look. She slowly took the food from Yana's hands and sniffed it. She kept examining her food for some time, but when she was sure that it was edible, she started greedily devouring the pieces of bread and ham.

"Wow, you really have one heck of an apetite..." Yana astonished, but he stopped quickly when he saw the sharp teeth inside girl's mouth. Yana hesitated for a moment but then he gulped and asked: "Uhmm, who are you anyway?" The girl stopped eating and looked at Yana with her mouth full. She then gulped and said: "Rumia." After saying that Rumia got back to eating her food again. Yana looked at eating Rumia for while.

"A-are you a youkai?" Yana managed to utter.

"Of course I am..." Rumia mumbled with her mouth full of food.

"T-then why did you save me from that other youkai?" Yana asked. He was ready to run away if needed.

"I didn't save you. I was going to steal you from Mystia and eat you myself, but it seems that there's no need for that anymore." Rumia answered, shrugged her shoulders and finished her meal.

"S-so you're not going to eat me?" Yana wanted to made sure that he was in no danger.

"Nah. You gave me food, so why would I eat you?" Rumia answered and layed on the ground.

"Well, thanks. You're a nice youkai, you know that." Yana said to lazing Rumia.

"Is that so? First time ever when human says that to me. Well actually, it was first time that anyone says that to me." Rumia said with gentle smile on her face.

"That was also the first time I've been hugged. You're not too bad of a human." Rumia continued and looked at Yana.

"Thanks, I guess." Yana answered. He smiled at Rumia and scratched his hair. Yana continued : "Uhmm, by the way. I was headed towards the Hakurei shrine when I got attacked by that Youkai earlier and now I'm completely lost. Could you lead me there? Having someone strong like you to accompany me would make me feel much more safer." Yana said to Rumia who was still laying on the ground.

"Hakurei shrine? It's fairly close from here. Hmmm, sure whatever." Rumia said while looking up like trying to memorize where the Hakurei shrine actually was.

"Thank you!" Yana enthused when he realized that he was going to be accompanied by a real youkai. Rumia got up lazily and yawned, then they headed towards the Hakurei shrine. It was still very dark but Yana felt much more safer while he was accompanied by Rumia, even if she was youkai. While they were walking Yana decided to ask few things from Rumia.

"Uhmm, so I've heard that every youkai has a special skill or ability. Do you have your own too?" Yana asked from smiling Rumia beside him.

"Yep. I can manipulate darkness. Let me show you... Hnnnnnh!" Rumia closed her eyes mumbled something and then she became shrouded in mass of darkness. She then strecthed her arms out from the mass of darkness and yelled: "Tadaaa!", while walking forward. Though she didn't get too far before walking directly at some random tree and bumped straight to it. Yana tried not to laugh at Rumia who was sitting on the ground, holding her head and muttering something. She then stood up and they continued walking towards the shrine.

"That was one unique ability you got there." Yana said to Rumia who was still holding her head.

"Well, thanks, but there are much more better abilities than mine. I really can't do anything else with my ability than cloak myself into darkness. If I just had more power..." Rumia mumbled.

"Hey, I've been wondering; why there aren't so many male youkai? Why most of you are female?" Yana asked from Rumia.

"Well, we casual youkai, who really don't belong to any real youkai race, have no need for males. We are born from humans' beliefs and fears. And when we finally die, nature will just simply spawn a new youkai to replace us. But the case with youkai races like Tengu, Oni or Kappa is, that their males are too weak to survive on their own, so they need the protection from their society to survive. That's why they live in their own villages. There are few exeptions though, like Tenma and Rinnosuke." Rumia explained to Yana and shrugged her shoulders.

"Rinnosuke? I've heard of him. He owns the shop near the human village. But isn't he a half youkai and half human?" Yana asked with curious tone.

"Yes, he is. I'm not sure how it works, but it seems that humans and youkai can reproduce together, though it's really rare. I know that Rinnosuke has a really long lifespan like us youkai normally do, but he really doesn't need any purpose or fear from humans to keep existing." Rumia explained as well as she could. She wasn't the smartest of youkai but she still knew a thing or two about her own kind.

"Then what about magicians? I heard that the pupeteer that lived in the forest before she... you know... was killed, was a human once." Yana kept on asking.

"Yes, you're right. As far as I know Alice indeed used to be human, but she turned herself into youkai. Those kinds of youkai that once were human are actually quite rare if we don't count vampires in, so it isn't too much of a surprise that there aren't any 'used to be human male magicians'. But when it comes to a natural magicians like Patchouli, they are creatures that are born from magic itself and they too are actually quite rare." Rumia explained to astonished Yana. It was really fascinating to listen to a real youkai talk.

"So, because you're a youkai, I assume that you're older than you look?" Yana continued with the questions.

"Yeah, I'm somewhere around 30-50 years old. Or at least I think I am. We youkai really don't keep track about our age." Rumia responded with contemplative look on her face. Yana decided that he had asked enough, so they continued walking silently. It only took about 15 minutes before they reached the stone stairs that lead to the shrine. The sun was about to rise but it still was really dark. They walked towards the shrine. Yana was looking around himself, Yukari was nowhere to be seen, but he didn't exept that Yukari would be just standing outside. Of course he would find Yukari inside. Yana hopped on to the shrine's terrace and knocked to the door. Rumia was standing beside him with curious look on her face. After a while Yana heard some mumbling from the inside and then finally the door opened.

"Yaaaawn* How may I help you?" Akyuu said with sleepy eyes. She didn't recognize Yana nor Rumia at first. Akyuu had semi long purple hair, green vest with long yellow sleeves and red long skirt. She was little bit younger than Reimu or Marisa.

"Uhmm, hi. Is Yukari somwhere around he..." Yana started asking, but he didn't get any further when Akyuu recognized the person standing beside Yana. Her eyes bursted wide open, she grabbed Yana from his sleeve, pulled him into the shrine and closed the door behind them.

"Oww, what was that for?" Yana muttered from the shrine's floor.

"Pant* pant* I just saved your life, you know." Akyuu responded to Yana when she was sure that the charms around the shrine would keep Rumia outside.

"Huh, what do you mean 'saved my life'?" Yana asked with confused look on his face.

"Didn't you notice that there was the youkai of darkness standing beside you!?" Akyuu responded with really unamused tone.

"Huh? She actually was the one who saved me. If she wouldn't have saved me from that sparrow youkai, I wouldn't stand here right now." Yana explained with still confused look on his face. Akyuu just stood there with confused look on her face, so Yana continued: "I gave her food for thanks and she accompanied me on my journey here."

"Unbeliveable... But I still wont allow her to enter this shrine. So anyway, why did you come here this early in the morning?" Akyuu asked from Yana after she had recovered from surprise that Rumia had been friendly towards a human being.

"I came too see Yukari. Can I meet her? Where is she anyway?" Yana explained to nodding Akyuu.

"I'm not sure if it is safe for you to meet her and I'm not sure if she's willing to take any visitors. And on top of that, I'd have to summon her first and I'm not even sure that she'll answer to my summons, so maybe you should come some other time." Akyuu answered to Yana who didn't seem to like what he heard.

"Aww, come on. It's not like I can just come when ever I want. I had to sneak out from the village in the middle of the night to even get here this once." Yana insisted with begging look on his face.

"Well, I'm afraid that I can't help you then, I'm sorr..." Akyuu said with compassionate tone, but she was interrupted before she could finish.

"No need to send him back to home, Akyuu. If he was able to become friends with that beast of youkai, then I'd be happy to have few words with him." Yukari said to Akyuu from behind her. She had appeared behind Akyuu from one of her gaps.

"Oh, I'm sorry Yukari, I didn't know you were here." Akyuu apologized to Yukari and bowed.

"Oh, no need to apologize. I wasn't here, but I'm watching you all the time so I decided that I'll talk to this boy. So, Yana was it? Why did you come to see me?" Yukari asked from Yana with gentle tone and smile on her face. Yana gulped, took a step forward and said: "I-I want you to tell me, why wont you revive Reimu." Yukari looked at Yana for while and sighed.

"I see... When the day ends, you cannot live that day aga..." Yukari said with unamused tone and turned around during her sentence, but she was interrupted by Yana: "I didn't come all the way here to talk philosophy with you. I want to know the exact reason, why you can't revive her. I want to know the truth!"

"You're an impertinent boy, but I like your spirit. You have strong will, so I will tell you why." Yukari said to Yana, chuckled a bit and turned around towards Yana.

"It's not that I don't want to bring her back. The true reason is that I or anyone else wont be able. I'm not saying that it's impossible, no, but we still would need her body and soul to do that, but as you may know, she was cremated. The original reason why people are ususally cremated after death was to prevent their revival. But it is still possible, BUT we still would need her soul which we cannot get because we would have to get Shiki Eiki's approval and we'll never get that. And on top of that, if were to get her soul and revive her, Eiki would start a war against us. She would never allow us to revive her, because if it were done once, there's too big of a change that someone would do it again and that would shake the balance between life and death. Now you know, why." Yuakri said with serious and a bit sad tone to Yana who just stood there and listened.

"B-but aren't you the youkai of boundaries? Shouldn't you be able to preserve the balance?" Yana asked with still begging look on his face.

"For preserving the balance, the ones who were revived should be killed. Sigh*" Yukari explained to Yana who started to look sad.

"Now, now. Sigh* I'm sorry that I had to dissapoint you, but there are limits for everything. Now you should head back home before your parents wake up. Rumia will keep you safe on your journey back." Yukari said to Yana with motherly tone and laid her hand to his shoulder.

"WHAT!? You'll leave this boy on to the mercy of that youkai!?" Akyuu shouted when she heard what Yukari said.

"No need to worry. If he was able become friends with her, he will be able to handle the situation." Yukari responded to Akyuu. Yukari the leaned closer to Akyuu and whispered to her ear: "I can clearly see that he would also like to revive Marisa too, so it would be just best if he could get something else to think about." She then turned around towards Yana once more and whispered to his ear: "I know that you want to become youkai hunter. This shall be your first trial; become friends with Rumia. You have strong spirit and maybe that'll allow you to become youkai hunter some day." Yana cracked gentle smile when he heard Yukari's words. He then bowed, turned around and stepped out from the shrine. Rumia was sitting on the terrace with smiling face.

"Could you lead me back to the human village?" Yana asked from smiling Rumia. Rumia grinned happily and responded: "Sure!" The two then just stood up and headed back to the human village. When they were at the stairs leading to the shrine, Sakuya was heading up the stairs to the shrine. She was looking really shocked and confused whe she saw a human kid accompanied by Rumia. Sakuya decided to just ignore it for now and ask about it from Akyuu. She was trying to get help from Akyuu with Flandre. Rumia and Yana just greeted confused Sakuya and continued to walk down the stairs.

When they got to the road leading to the human village, Yana took a deep breath and asked from Rumia: "Uhmm, when I get back to the village, I wont be able to go out for while, but when I can, would you like to come and play with me? Something like hide and seek? I could bring some food for you too." Rumia looked at Yana with confused look on her face and responded: "Y-you would want to play with me?" Rumia's face lightened up a lot when she heard Yana's request.

"Sure! It would be fun." Rumia continued and smiled. Yana smiled back at her and they kept on walking towards the human village.

When they finally got to the human village, Rumia waved a good-bye for Yana as she flew off. The sun was about just about to rise. Yana wanted to get back to his house, so anyone wouldn't suspect a thing. He walked closer to the gate of the village and saw how the guard was sleeping.

"Sigh* What kind of guard are you?" Yana bridled as he walked past the guard. He then quickly ran back to his house and opened the door.

"Phew* It seems that my father and mother are still sleeping." Relieved Yana thought to himself. He sneaked to his room and went to his bed as he would have been sleeping this whole time. Yana chucled a bit. The plan had worked perfectly. He got the answers, even if he didn't find them to his liking and he was able to become friends with a real youkai.

Back at the Hakurei shrine, Sakuya was just about to leave the shrine. Akyuu had told her about what had happened with Yana.

"Incredible... He'll become a fine youkai hunter some day. And to get Yukari to tell him the exact reasons why she wont revive Reimu... Very, very promising." Sakuya thought to herself when she was leaving the shrine with Akyuu. Sakuya had persuaded Akyuu to come with her to the Scarlet Devil Mansion to help them with Flandre. She really hoped that Akyuu would be able to talk Flandre to come out from her room. Akyuu didn't have any kind of magical powers, not even slightest amount, so they had to walk. It was going to take them a while till they would reach the Scarlet Devil Mansion.

"Why haven't you tried to learn some magic? You could fly and maybe even exterminate youkai. You wouldn't be so dependant on Yukari any more." Sakuya asked from Akyuu. She really didn't like to walk. She was so used to fly that it felt weird to just walk around Gensokyo.

"Sigh* Well, Yukari has offered me that she would be willing to teach me, but I really don't want to. You see, I'm not a real shrine maiden, so magic isn't natural for me and there's always a change that usage of magic would turn me into youkai and I really don't want that. I really don't want to take any risks, especially after the incident with Marisa." Akyuu responded with serious tone.

"Can't blame you for that." Sakuya answered and nodded to indicate that she understood Akyuu's point. The journey to the Scarlet Devil Mansion took them about two hours and Sakuya really didn't seem to be liking the fact that her mistress would have to wait that long for their return. Akyuu on the other hand didn't seem too bothered that she had to walk for so long, but eventually they reached the mansion.

At the gates they were greeted like always by Hong Meiling. Meiling was happy that Akyuu had decided to help them with Flandre. When Meiling had tried to talk Flandre to come out, there hadn't been any kind of response, so she really hoped that Akyuu would succeed.

When they entered the mansion, Sakuya quickly noticed how Akyuu got more nervous. Akyuu was completely ordinary human so it can be expected that she would get nervous when entering to the property of Scarlet vampires. Sakuya comforted her by saying, that she was guest and she would be treated properly, so there would be no need to worry. Remilia quickly joined them.

"Miss Hieda, I assume?" Remilia asked when she reached Sakuya and Akyuu.

"Yes, yes. I've heard the situation. I hope that I'm able to help." Akyuu responded and bowed. Remilia just nodded and they proceeded to walk to the basement. They finally reached the door of the room that Flandre used to be locked up in before she became friends with Marisa. Her current room was in the basement too, but wasn't as deep within the basement as this. The room felt really unwelcoming and almost like evil when they looked at the door. The door was as huge as the one in front of Remilia's room, but this one was made of stone and it had some strange runes carved to it. The door looked like that behind it would be something equivilant to hell or something like that.

"The last time she was in this room was back in the Red Mist incident. After that we gave her her own room from the upper basement. It made me really worried when she shut herself there again. I fear that she might fall to insanity yet again." Remilia said with worried tone to Akyuu who was just standing there and looking at the door. She then walked to the door, gulped and knocked. Akyuu had only once before met Flandre. It was back when she was making her own youkai encyclopedia and she had interviewed Flandre because of that. Back then Flandre was still quite nuts and Akyuu really didn't like the idea that Flandre would return back to that state. After she had knocked to the door she waited for moment. There was no response. She knocked again.

"Flandre, it's me, Akyuu! You remeber me don't you?" Akyuu yelled through the door.

"I know that this is really hard for you, but you can't just shut yourself in there! So can you please open this door so we can talk normally!?" Akyuu tried, but there still wasn't any kind of response. Akyuu sat down and continued: "Hey, you know, you are not alone with your grief. There was this boy from the human village, who threathened his own life just to get to the Hakurei shrine to speak with Yukari, and he was even able to become friends with Rumia. He too wanted to revive Reimu... and... sigh* Marisa too. Yukari explained to him why it couldn't be done, but he accepted it. I don't mean that I wouldn't allow you to be sad, but I'll ask you to try to find a new happiness from life. There's so much to live for and I bet that if you try you can be happy once more." Akyuu spoke through the door. There was long silence. Akyuu sighed and stood up. It looked like that even she wasn't able to get Flandre to come out. But then, when she was just about to turn around from the door, they heard a faint clicking sound and some strange humming. Then all the runes on the surface of the stone door started to glow in deep red hue and the door slowly slided away. They saw how Flandre was pointing her hand, that was glowing in the same color as the runes, towards and then she lowered her hand and just looked at Akyuu, Remilia and Sakuya who were standing before her.

Akyuu looked at Flandre with surprised look, but then she saw the room behind her. It was more like a cave than room. There was a huge sinister looking bed in the middle of the so called room and huge threatening stalagmites hanging from the whole ceiling and from the floor near the walls. There were some really deformed and creepy paintings and writing on the walls which looked really old and seemed like they were made with blood. And when she listened really carefully she heard really low, faint and threatening rhythmic drumming from the inside of the room. She couldn't tell where the drumming was caming from, but she guessed that it was caused by some spell. Was it done by Flandre or someone else? Akyuu couldn't tell, but if Flandre was being trapped in this 'room' for almost 500 years, no wonder if she became mad.

Flandre just stood there quietly and looked at Akyuu. She then took few steps towards Akyuu and said: "It was in this room where I became friends with Marisa. It reminds me about her."

"I understand completely how you feel, but please, you just can't shut yourself away from everything." Akyuu said to Remilia's younger sister with motherly tone. Flandre nodded with sad look on her face and continued: "You mentioned that boy. Was he truly willing to endanger his own life, just to get answers about Reimu and Marisa?"

"Yes. His name was Yana. Yukari said that he'll become a fine youkai hunter one day. I understood that he really deeply admired Reimu and Marisa, but you have to understand, that no matter how much you love someone, you can't bring them back." Akyuu said to Flandre and lowered her hand to Flandre's shoulder. Flandre put her own hand on top of Akyuu's, looked at her and responded: "I... I know that... sigh* I'm sorry that I have caused so much stress for you, my sister, Sakuya and everyone else."

"Don't be sorry. You have every right to be mourning, but please, come with us. You haven't eaten properly for long time." Remilia said and took a hold of Flandre's hand. Flandre nodded to her sister and they headed upstairs, but before they headed up Flandre looked at Akyuu without being noticed by Sakuya nor Remilia. She made really sinister and unamused look on her face and whispered to Akyuu: "Don't ever underestimate me!" Akyuu was really shocked when she heard Flandre's words but she decided to ignore them for now and follow Sakuya, Flandre and Remilia. She knew that Flandre was still mourning because of Marisa, so she thought that Flandre just didn't think about what she was saying to her.

They headed up and went to the dining room to eat. Sakuya prepared a meal for Remilia, Flandre and Akyuu. At first Akyuu wasn't sure if she wanted to eat the food that she was offered, but when Sakuya promised that there were no humans used in making that exact repast, a bit more relived Akyuu started to eat. Meiling, Patchouli and Koakuma quickly joined them and every one of them thanked Akyuu with happy and relieved looks on their faces. Akyuu just respnded that it was her pleasure to help them. She was too shy so she belittled her achivement a bit. Flandre ate her food pretty quickly and as soon as she did finish she stood up, thanked Sakyua and Akyuu and then said that she'll go to the library. Akyuu thought that if she should tell Remilia what Flandre had whispered to her before they headed up or not, but she decided to not to do that, because she just thought that Flandre is just like that sometimes and it has been really hard for her.

After they had finished, Remilia ordered Sakuya to accompany Akyuu on her way back to the shrine. Sakuya just bowed to indicate that she understood, but Akyuu chuckled a bit when she saw frustration from Sakuya's face when she realized that she would have to walk for two hours again. Akyuu felt a bit sorry for her, but knew that Sakuya wouldn't want disappoint her mistress and she would follow her orders, so there was no need to apologize for Sakuya. They headed back to the shrine as soon as possible, so they would get there before the sun would set. But they all were completely oblivious about what Flandre had in her mind. She was currently just sitting in the library reading some old book.

"We can't revive her, you say? Oh, but you just told that I can. Those three weeks I spent in that terrible room thinking, how in the world I would be able to get Marisa's blood, but that's no problem anymore. Now only thing I need is to get her soul back..." Flandre thought to herself while reading. The book that she was reading contained information about the Gensokyo's parallel dimensions; Makai and the real Hell where Yamas like Eiki Shiki were living in. Or to be precise, the Yamas don't live anywhere, but they control the hell and that was Flandre's destination. She knew that the most likely place where Marisa's soul was, was the Hell and Flandre had to get there somehow. She knew that it was possible to reach that place without actually dying and she knew two persons who had succeeded; Reimu and Mima. Reimu wasn't an option so she had to somehow find Mima. Well Mima is an evil spirit so she technically isn't alive, but Reimu was able to survive, so that was enough for Flandre. Flandre remebered how Marisa had mentioned Mima before she died, so Flandre wanted to settle the her score too with Mima and sfter she would have done that, she force her to show how to get to the Hell. The only problem is that no one really knew where Mima currently was, assuming that she even existed anymore.

"What are you reading?" Flandre heard Patchouli asking suddenly behind her.

"I want to find Mima..." Flandre casually replied and put the book away.

"What for?" Patchouli asked with confused and curious tone.

"Marisa mentioned that Mima wasn't too kind for her, so I want to get revenge for her." Flandre responded and glared strictly into Patchouli's eyes.

"Sigh* You really should try to forget about her and get over with it." Patchouli said to Flandre with sad look on her face and sat down beside her.

"No, I'll never forget her, and I wont have peace before I know that the one who kept her seperated from her family is punished!" Flandre responded with determined look on her face.

"Sigh* Well, I heard that Reimu and Marisa met in Makai back when Marisa was still Mima's minion, so it is most likely that she would be there. But please, try to calm down. Revenge isn't going to bring her back." Patchouli said with compassionate tone.

"Oh, but there's where you're wrong, my dear Patchy. Hehehee..." Flandre thought to herself, but she just nodded to Patchouli to indicate that she understood. Patchouli then stood up and got back to her magic research. Flandre now knew where she would find Mima, so now she would only need to know how to get to Makai. She gathered every book from the Scarlet Devil Mansion's library that they got about Makai. She read books for whole evening and night. When the sun was about to rise and it was time for Flandre to go to sleep, she had come to the conclusion that the only way to get to the Makai was with the Myouren temple's Palanquin ship. She would just need to get Byakuren to transport her to Makai with it, though she had no idea how she was going to do that.

Meanwhile, Patchouli had noticed that Flandre truly was planning to travel to Makai and decided to talk to Remilia about it.

"I'm really worried. Flandre is truly planning on to traveling into Makai. She said that she wants to get revenge on Mima. It's time to go to sleep now, so when she wakes up, could you go and talk to her." Patchouli asked from Remilia with worried look on her face.

"Thanks for letting me know, Patchy. She has just recently started to go outside, so it's too early for her to go to different dimensions and if she's planning to get revenge, we can't be sure how thoughtless things she might end up doing. Makai doesn't know the spell card rules so it is too dangerous. Yes, I'll talk to her as soon as it's evening again, but now we all need some sleep." Remilia responded to relieved Patchouli. Patchouli ordered Koakuma to take Flandre to her room, but they had no idea that Flandre was eavesdropping on them and she wasn't going to allow Remilia or anyone else to keep her from traveling to Makai.

As soon as Flandre went to her room Patchouli summoned a spell on the door that would prevent her from sneaking out. They did this for just in case, because they couldn't tell what Flandre was planning to do. Patchouli and the others sighed for relief when they were sure that Flandre couldn't escape and everyone else went to sleep too, even Sakuya who was really tired after all that walking.

"Heh. An easy clone trick was enough to fool them as expected." Flandre chuckled from above Remilia and others in her bat form when they were leaving the basement. Flandre knew that if she was going to wait till the evening, they would have another cheap way to keep her from leaving the mansion. When she was sure that everyone had gone to sleep she headed straight to the lobby. She didn't want to waste any more time, so she merged her clone back to her and took her parasol. She then opened the main door as quietly as possible to not wake anybody and stepped out. It was unpleasantly sunny, but Flandre wanted to get to the Myouren temple as fast as possible so she took off immediately and headed towards human village. Myouren temple was to the southeast from the human village so she would need to fly directly over it, but she really didn't care if humans saw her passing by.

She quickly flew over the Misty Lake and headed towards the Forest of Magic. Memories started to rise to Flandre's mind when she was above the Forest of Magic. How she had walked through it to get to Marisa's house in the first time and how she had rescued Marisa from the storm. When she arrived to the meadow she had crossed with the help of that invisibility potion she couldn't do anything else but to land there for moment. This was the place where she had maybe first and last time felt sun on her skin without hurting herself. She looked around herself and saw the huge spruce tree that she had used to cast signals to indicate her and Marisa's location in that storm. She walked up to the tree and few tears rose to her eyes. She touched the tree and thought to herself: "Don't worry Marisa... This time I have enough power to drag you to safety on my own." Flandre made a determined grinn and took off again.

She flew only about ten seconds before she came across Marisa's home. She knew that she was in hurry, but she just couldn't fly over it without stopping by. She gently descended to the terrace of the Marisa's house. It has already been four weeks since someone had set foot inside this house, so the garden had started to look pretty unattented and wild. Flandre stepped inside. All the magical objects that Marisa had gathered had been taken back by their real owners. It was actually kinda sad sight to see. The house was almost completely empty. Only some furniture remained. Then she happened to look at the shelfs. There it stood, the glass urn that still contained the vapors that Marisa had collected from her. She took a few steps closer to the urn and grabbed it. She looked at the grey mist with angry and sad look on her face. She then threw it in to the air, pointed her hand towards it and then squeezed her hand in to a fist. The whole urn exploded and then disappeared. Not even single fragment of glass remained. She then walked through the hole that still was in the wall of Marisa's house. Without looking back, she took off once again and headed towards the human village and Myouren temple.

The journey didn't take too long till Flandre reached the human village. She didn't care if her pass by would cause some jitters amongst the humans, so she just casually speeded up a bit and flew over the village. Humans in the village didn't recognize Flandre but they were sure that this red stripe on the sky wasn't human. This got many humans worried that some youkai would just casually trespass through the human village, especially Yana's father. He didn't like this fact a one bit and decided to go and talk to Akyuu about this. Flandre was completely oblivious about this as she landed before the gates of Myouren temple. She then proceeded to walk inside.

"Oh miss vampire? What are you doing here in the middle of the day?" Flandre heard Kyouko saying when she walked through the gates. Kyouko was quite small in size, somewhere around the same size as Flandre. She had semi long teal colored hair and quite large floppy ears instead of normal ears. They looked like dog ears but they had long and brown fur covering them. She was wearing a long pale pink skirt with teal colored buttons and white dress below it. She also had a short fluffy tail. She was Yamabiko by species. A youkai that created echoes. Yamabikos were endangered youkai species because only few people believed in them anymore.

"I'm here to see Byakuren. Do you know where she is?" Flandre answered to curious Kyouko.

"Huh? It's strange to hear that you would have business with her, but she should be just in the temple. Go right in." Kyouko responded with happy but a bit confused tone. The Scarlet Devil Mansion residents didn't ususally visit Myouren temple. Flandre thanked Kyouko and headed in to the temple. It was quite large, but not even nearly as large as the Scarlet Devil Mansion. It was quite casual Buddhist temple, but what made it special was the huge Palanquin ship that was floating above it. Flandre stepped inside. It was quite beautiful in there, but she had no time for sightseeing, so she headed deeper in to the temple to find Byakuren. After a while Flandre soon found her from the inner courtyard, sitting on side walk. Byakuren was meditating but she was already aware of Flandre's presence.

"Come forth my child, you have nothing to fear here." Byakuren said with closed eyes and without even turning her head towards Flandre. She then opened her eyes, stood up and turned around towards Flandre.

"Tell me, miss Scarlet, why have you come here." Byakuren said to Flandre with motherly tone. Byakuren had long and wavy brown hair that faded purple at the top. She was quite tall and lady like as Yukari. She was wearing a black and white dress with long strips of black fabric going across the middle. Along with her dress, she was wearing a cape that was black on the outside and red on the inside.

"I'm going straight to the point here, I need to get to Makai." Flandre said with serious look on her face and arms crossed over her chest. Byakuren looked very surprised and a bit shocked when she heard why Flandre had come to the temple.

"Wh-Well that's an odd thing to hear. Why do you seek passage to Makai if I may ask?" Byakuren asked with motherly but confused tone. Flandre just sighed and answered semi honestly: "I want to find Mima. She was the one who was keeping Marisa from returning back to her family. I want to get revenge for her." Flandre knew that Byakuren really didn't like the concept of revenge or violence in any way, but she couldn't just yell out loud that she was going to revive Marisa.

"I see. Well if that's the case, I'm afraid that I can't help you." Byakuren responded with with strict and unamused tone.

"We Buddhists don't allow any kind of violence except self defence and even that only in the extreme cases." She continued with still very harsh tone.

"Yes, I know that, but is there any way that would change your mind? Marisa was my dearest friend and I really well know that you are well experienced with the feeling of loosing your loved ones, or am I wrong?" Flandre responded with strict and a bit accusatory tone. Byakuren looked a bit shocked when she heard Flandre's words, but she maintained her calm.

"Yes, I very well know how you feel. But when my brother died, I didn't want to get revenge on anybody because of his death." Byakuren defended herself with a bit offended tone.

"I didn't mean to offend you in any way. I just meant that I know that you became a youkai because you started to fear death after your brother died. For every action, there's a consequence, wouldn't you agree. I just can't let that evil spirit to be just left alone after Marisa's and Reimu's death." Flandre said with apologizing tone.

"You're truly right, but you can't achieve good things by doing evil deeds." Byakuren responded and nodded with understanding look on her face.

"But there's no good without evil." Flandre answered to Byakuren's philosophical challenge. Flandre knew that Byakuren was testing her here.

"But are you willing to become the evil you want to destroy?" Byakuren asked from Flandre with motherly tone.

"The acts of good are not always wise and acts of evil are not always foolish, but nevertheless we should always strive for good. But yes, I'm ready to take evil actions for greater good, because there's currently no way to get justice with good deeds." Flandre responded with refined tone. Byakuren cracked a gentle smile and said to Flandre: "So it shall be. You've proven righteousness of your aspirations and because of that, I'm willing to help you."

"Thank you. When will we be leaving?" Flandre bowed and asked with smiling face.

"Immediately. I really don't like what I'm doing, but if you truly want to get to Makai that badly, I'm going to help. Are you okay with that?" Byakuren asked before rising from the ground.

"Yes, I am. It actually is just what I was hoping for." Flandre said with happy look on her face and then she too took off from the ground and followed Byakuren.

"I hope that you understand thet we are not returning to pick you up after we leave you there. That's why I'll give you this amulet. It will open a portal back to Gensokyo when used in Makai." Byakuren said in mid air and gave Flandre a some sort of amulet. Flandre looked at the amulet for moment and then put it into her pocket to keep it safe. They soon were high enough to land to deck of the Palanquin ship. Flandre looked around herself, it looked like a normal ship but it still was somehow flying. Byakuren walked towards the bridge and when she was close enough, Murasa opened the door and bowed before Byakuren.

Murasa had semi long black hair and she was wearing a quite casual white sailors outfit with teal stripes on her hem and sleeves. She also had a red neckerchief around her neck and hat of a captain on top of her head.

"Take the course towards Makai, we're leaving immediately." Byakuren said to saluting Murasa.

"Wh-huh? Just out of nowhere? Why?" Murasa asked with confused look on her face and scrached her head.

"This young vampire is seeking passage to there and I promised to help." Byakuren answered and looked at curious Flandre who was looking around herself.

"Well, this came quite quickly, but if you say so..." Murasa said with still confused tone and headed to bridge. Byakure turned towards Flandre, walked up to her and said: "You should get inside, we're leaving soon." Flandre nodded and followed Byakuren to her quarters. When they arrived to Byakuren's quarters Flandre started looking through the window. She wanted to know what it looked like, to travel across dimensions. Byakuren walked next to her and lowered her hand to Flandre's shoulder.

"It truly is breathtaking moment when you can witness it as the passenger..." Byakuren said with empty look on her eyes. Then a faint humming sound could be heard and when Flandre looked outside she saw how the world below them started to stretch like they would be moving, but Flandre felt that they didn't move. The world kept stretching and stretching, wider and wider as they would be traveling almost at the speed of light and then, with a huge flash everything went dark on the outside. When she looked through the window she saw just weals of ligh passing by. They looked like stars, but they were moving with so intense speeds that she couldn't tell.

"A breathtaking moment, isn't it? Come it's much more beautiful when you see it from the outside of the ship." Byakuren said to astonished Flandre. Flandre then looked at Byakuren with confused look on her face and said: "B-but there's no... eh..."

"Oh, no need to worry. Come, you really need to see this." Byakuren encouraged hesitant Flandre and finally Flandre decided to follow Byakuren. She followed Byakuren to the main door. Byakuren just looked at confused Flandre, nodded and then opened the door. It was sight to behold. Flandre saw how they were traveling in unbeliveably high speed and how there were weals of light passing by from all directions.

"A beautiful sight, isn't it? This is the World of Fantasies. A world between ours and Makai. This isn't outer space, so you can freely breath here, but most of the World of Fantasies is almost empty void, like our own universe. But in the World of Fantasies, the void is filled with air. This isn't our world so laws of nature are different in here, so don't ask how they work. I have no idea myself." Byakuren said calmly, but Flandre saw how Byakuren's eyes were sparkling with happiness.

"So all these beams of light are stars?" Flandre asked with astonished tone and look on her face.

"Don't know. They could be. I don't know how the nature works in this world and we have never explored any part of this world, so I have no idea." Byakuren answered with motherly tone and smile on her face. Soon they started to see bigger constellations and stars with different colors. But when they waited for few minutes they noticed how stars suddenly stopped appearing. They looked behind the ship and saw how they had just left a huge colorful galaxy behind them. It was something that one couldn't just simply forget.

"The journey is going to take almost whole day, so you should go to sleep. It is day, so isn't it time for vampires to go to sleep?" Byakuren asked from Flandre who was just looking the galaxy behind them. Flandre then remembered that she had not slept for almost 24 hours and started to feel very tired all of sudden. She yawned and nodded to Byakuren. Byakuren cracked a gentle smile and guided Flandre to her own room.

"I'll wake you, let's say about hour before we reach Makai. Is that okay?" Byakuren asked from Flandre before she left Flandre's room. Flandre just nodded while laying on her bed under the blanket and smiled. Byakuren then just nodded and left Flandre's room. Flandre knew that after she entered Makai there was no going back. She had come this far and wouldn't allow herself to fail.

"Flan, are you up yet?" Remilia yelled. She was standing in front of the door of Flandre's room. Patchouli was with her. Patchouli then lifted the spell from the door, so Remilia could enter.

"Flan, I've heard that yo-huh? What is this? Patchy where is she?" Remilia yelled when she saw that Flandre's room was empty.

"I-I don't understand... We saw how she went to sleep and then we sealed the door. Where she could have gone?" Patchouli said with confused tone while looking through the room.

"Gahh, we're stupid! A simple clone trick... She knew that we were going to stop her from leaving so she left before we could stop her. FUCK!" Remilia yelled in frustration when she realized what had happened. She quickly headed back to lobby and through the main door. It was a late evening so she could easily just go out. She headed straight to the Hakurei shrine to see, if Akyuu had seen her. She figured that it would be her best lead.

"She just can't leave just like that. She doesn't understand how dangerous it can be..." Remilia thought to herself while flying towards the Hakurei shrine. When she reached the shrine she landed to the shrine's terrace and knocked to the door.

"Akyuu, are you there!? We have a situation!" Remilia yelled through the door. It took a moment, but finally Akyuu stepped out with really tired look on her face.

"Yaaawn* What do you want this late in the evening?" Akyuu asked in confusion from frustrated Remilia.

"It's Flan! She's gone! We heard that she was trying to get to Makai, but we tried to stop her. Well, as I said, we 'tried'... She got out and now we think that she might try to get to Makai. Have you seen her or do you have any clue where she might be?" Remilia explained and asked in haste.

"Well... Yaaawn* There was this man from human village, who came here and claimed that there was this red youkai that they saw flying over the village and soon after the Palanquin ship, that was floating above the Myouren temple, took off. So it was Flandre? Why would she want to get to Makai?" Akyuu remembered and asked from Remilia.

"Awww shit! So we're too late. She was talking about getting revenge on Mima or something like that." Remilia responded in frustrated tone. Akyuu soon realized, how dangerous that could be, not just for Flandre but for Makai itself. But Remilia and Akyuu still had no idea what Flandre was truly after. No one else than Flandre did.

"Flandre, you should wake up. we are soon arriving to Makai." Byakuren yelled through the door of Flandre's quarters. After few minutes Flandre opened the door, stepped out and yawned.

"Did you sleep well?" Byakuren asked with gentle smile on her face.

"Yep." Flandre answered while streching her arms.

"Come, you should see something before we enter to Makai." Byakuren said and signed Flandre to follow her. Flandre followed Byakuren to the door leading to the deck. Byakuren casually opened the door and walked outside and Flandre followed. Flandre looked around herself a bit and then looked at Byakuren with confused look on her face and asked: "Where are all the stars?" Flandre was right. There were no stars or galaxies anywhere to be seen. They were traveling towards endless and starless darkness. Byakuren just smiled a bit and pointed behind Flandre. Flandre then turned around and was amazed. Behind them was a whole network of galaxies. It was unimaginably huge and beautiful.

"There are no galaxies or stars beyond here. We're starting to reach the edge of the World of Fantasies." Byakuren said and looked at the darkness that they were traveling towards. Flandre too then turned around and looked at the limitless darkness before them. She was a vampire, so she was used to dark but this was different. The darness gave you the feeling of endless sorrow and despair. It felt like that there was no hope beyond here. It felt like clear warning, but she decided to ignore this feeling.

"Come, we should head inside before we enter Makai." Byakuren said with serious tone and headed inside. Flandre followed her. She knew that she would soon be a one step closer to Marisa's revival. Flandre followed Byakuren to her quarters and looked through the window.

"There are no visible objects, but I sense that we are close to Makai now. It shouldn't take longer than few minutes." Byakuren said while sitting behind her desk and writing something. Flandre then noticed how the darkness was slowly changing to whiteness and then, after a sudden flash the world behind the window changed.

"We are here. Murasa, we'll land immediately!" Byakuren yelled at some funnel on her desk.

"Come, we wont wait for long. After you get off, we'll head back and you'll be on your own." Byakuren said with serious tone. Flandre just nodded and followed Byakuren to outside.

"I really hoped that I would not need to see this place again... Below us is Hokkai. We are at very edge of Makai. Just head towards the city. I bet that you'll find what you are looking for from there." Byakuren said to silent Flandre. Flandre then nodded and bowed to Byakuren for thanks and then jumped off from the Palanquin ship. She floated down and landed gently to the ground. She then looked up and saw how the Palanquin ship started to glow and then with bright flash, disappeared.

"Well, better be careful from now on..." Flandre thought to herlself after the ship had vanished. She then looked around herslef to see, what kind of world Makai was. The sky was completely black and there were no stars except one. It was the sun of Makai. Flandre was a vampire, so when she noticed that she was completely exposed to the sun, her heart skipped a beat, but she soon realized that the sun of Makai didn't hurt her. But eve if it didn't hurt Flandre, the sun didn't feel nice at all. It wasn't even nearly as bright as their sun back at Gensokyo. It was really gloomy and ominous. It was just an orange ball hanging about 20 decrees above horizon glowing dimly, just bright enough to create a small sphere of light around it against the completely black sky. When you looked at it, it felt like you were watching at a black hole. The sun also moved quite fast, but it didn't move vertically like someone would expect. It was moving horizontally and it seemed that because of that it would never set below horizon.

Flandre then looked at the landscape. The ground below her seemed to some sort of stone. It was completely plane except for few cracks here and there and it seemed that she was standing on the slope of some mountain. The ground seemed like obsidian. It was almost black and it had this dim metallic gloss to it. The color of the land made it really hard to see where the horizon were. She looked around the black mountain and saw how there was lava pouring out from the slope of the mountain. She then looked towards and saw how the sun was creating a silhouette of city to the horizon. There were tall skyscarpers in the distance.

"A city, eh?" Flandre thought to herself and started to fly towards it. Byakuren had said that she would find the answers she wanted from the city, so she headed there. She descended down the mountain quite fast and soon realized how flat the landscape was. This plain obsidian like stone was covering the whole ground except for few cracks and ravines that had lava deep within them. She soon came across a bit more rougher landscape. It was somekind of rocky hill. She decided to fly over it, but she soon realized that on top of the hill was a huge ruined temple. It was almost completely made of stone and it seemed really old. Flandre was curious and decided to head inside to see if there was something useful in there. When she entered the ruined temple, she saw a really classy looking main hall filled with angel statues. Even if the whole place was in ruins, it still looked quite well preserved. When she walked deeper in to the main hall, it actually started to look more and more like a church of somekind. There were even a few candles burning here and ther, but suddenly a cold wind blew through the hall, quenching all the candles and shutting the main door behind Flandre. It became really dark and silent.

"A star has died... A bottomless curse, a bottomless sea... A source of greatness... A call of the blood where ever they be... Do you hear the cry... Call of the blood but your soul is dry... A lair beast... A bottomless dark..." Flandre heard someone chanting. The chanting was really rhythmic and ominous. Then some pale blueish character appeared at on top of stairs in front of Flandre. The character had six wings with white feathers on its back and a really graceful and angel like body. The character had knee-length hair. It had long simple pale blue dress with long sleeves and the character was holding some strange wand.

"Who or what are you?" Flandre asked fearlesly from the character before her.

"My... name... is... Sariel." The character answered with slow and so echoing tone that it was hard to tell was the character male or female.

"I have been... waiting for you... Flandre Scarlet... daughter of the Devil... the one who broke free..." The character continued.

"H-how did you know my name? What are you?" Flandre asked and took a step backwards. She sansed that the person in front of her was something different.

"As I said... my name is Sariel. I am the Seraphim of Makai... the angel... of death. I am the fallen watcher... and one of the seven holy angels. I am the command of... God." The character answered with calm and echoing voice. Flandre's eyes bursted wide open when she realized who the character was. She immediately kneeled before the pale blueish person and said: "I'm sorry that I didn't recognize you immediately." The Seraphim at the top of the stairs just calmly answered: "No need to be sorry... I know why you are here, so there is no need to worry or hide anything. You seek to revive... Marisa Kirisame. Your desires will take you back... to the depths of hell... She belived in different gods, so she is not within our influence... and neither is what happens when you bring her back... We aproach the time of reckoning and your actions, Flandre Scarlet, will affect to the results. You will face a decision that will decide the fate of so many. But mark my words, you are the only one capable of doing so..."

"Wh... Why are you telling this to me? Why are you here in Makai?" Flandre asked carefully after she had stood up again.

"My duty was originally to punish the traitorous Seraphim who created this twisted world, but I ended up getting trapped here myself. After that, I have corrupted this world with my powers and just waited for you to finally free me and finish the job that I have started. Now I am tired... so, so tired. You must free me." Sariel answered calmly to Flandre's questions.

"What do you mean, finish the job?" Flandre asked in confusion.

"I am trapped here in this Fallen Temple and in this body. You must kill my mortal body so my spirit can return back to the heavens. After that, you must find and punish the one who created this world." Sariel explained with echoing voice.

"T-to kill you? B-but I..." Flandre tried to slur with shocked look on her face.

"There is no need to be afraid. We have to battle, so we can be sure that you are capable of finishing this. When you have freed my soul, I promise that I will come to help you in your time of need. Now there is no need for words any more... Face me and prove your worth!" Sariel said, pointed the wand up and it turned in to a blueish spectral sword. Flandre took a step backwards and the look on her face switched from confusion to determination. She readied her Lävatein and it started to burn with intense flames. Then after Flandre had readied herself, Sariel dashed down the stairs and with one unimaginably powerful swing, cut almost the whole temple in half. The swing was followed with shockwave of blue energy and then after few seconds the shockwave's trail lit on fire. Flandre had managed to dodge in time and was amazed by the power that Sariel wielded. She then jumped in to the air, spinned few times and surrounded herself in flames created by her Lävatein. Then, from the middle of the firestorm, Flandre charged towards Sariel and tried to hit that six winged angel. Sariel just lifted the spectral sword and with single hand blocked Flandre's attack. Flandre was surprised because Sariel didn't even flinch. Sariel then pushed Flandre back and immediately dashed towards her. Sariel followed with similiar attack as last time and easily crushed dozens of those statues while doing so. Flandre this time decided to block the attack instead of dodging it. Flandre was just barely able to stay still when Sariels blade collided with her's. The sound was deafening when those two mighty weapons collided. Flandre then ran up to Sariel with her Lävatein still rolled together with Sariel's blade, so that Sariel couldn't counter. There were sparks of magic and pure energy when those two weapons were scraping each other. When Flandre was almost close enough to touch Sariel, Sariel spinned around to left and tried to cut Flandre in half. Flandre was fast enough to turn herself in to a bat and dodge the attack. Sariel didn't stop and spinned another time, but this attack was blocked by Flandre. Flandre could sense that Sariel was bit surprised when that angel looked at her. Flandre had turned back from her bat form, but now instead of one, there were four Flandres blocking the attack. Then, at the same time they all looked at Sariel and simultaneously they all pushed Sariel back and then every clone of Flandre and Flandre herself, swinged their Lävateins at Sariel at the same time. Sariel destoyed two of Flandre's clones with single sword swipe, but Flandre and one of her clones managed to hit the Seraphim with all their might. Those two hits were enough to rip the six winged angel to hundreds of pieces. Then the angel just simply disappeared from in front of Flandre.

"Thank you. For this you have my eternal thanks." Flandre heard Sariel's echoing voice saying and then it became silent. Flandre just stood there breathing heavily and then fused back together with her clones. It was really hard for her to even comprehend what had just happened. Sariel's words just echoed in her mind.

"A decision? What did Sariel mean by that?" Flandre thought to herself. She decided to not to think about it too hard yet because she now had another goal beside saving Marisa; find and punish the creator of Makai and then bring this world down. She didn't want to disappoint Sariel so she decided to get going. She then walked to the back of the Fallen Temple and stepped out from the back door. Between her and the city were just this huge plain of this obsidian like stone. The so called sun was now exactly behind the city so its silhouette was clearly visible. Flandre took a deep breath and thought that it wasn't going to be long journey before she would reach the city. She then took off from the rocky hill and headed towards the distant city.

She flew with her greatest speed, so the journey to the city didn't take too long. When she was close enough, she noticed that the city was in two parts which were divided by something that looked like a sea. Flandre landed to the shore to be sure. She touched the surface of the liquid and it truly was water.

"Well at least something in this world is normal." Flandre thought to herself and then looked at the two parts of the city. The half of the city on her left side seemed to contain more skyscrapers and there seemed to be some sort of temple there so she decided to head there. It seemed that she would most likely find answers from there.

Flandre flew alongside the shore to reach the city. When she got close enough she started to see the skyscrapers more clearly. It seemed that they were made of stone and were much larger than they looked from the distance. She looked around herself a bit. It was strange. There were only few youkai here and there and none of them reacted to Flandre's presence in any way. It felt almost like that she didn't exist. There was one youkai standing on the streets and Flandre decided to go and talk to that youkai. Flandre landed in front of the youkai and said: "Excuse me, could you tell me, what's in that temple?" But the youkai just looked at Flandre without saying a word and then just simply took off. Flandre just looked the youkai fly away in to the space between the skyscrapers. Flandre just sighed and thought that it was hopeless to get any information from these youkai. Flandre then looked at the temple, that was in the middle of the city and headed there, because it looked most promising place to get information.

When Flandre got closer to the temple, it started to look more and more like a some kind of fortress than a temple. Finally when she reached the building she looked at it for while it. It was made of stone like the rest of the buildings in the city, but this one was completely polished.

"Looks important..." Flandre muttered to herself as she walked towards the main gates of the fortress. She opened the gates and stepped inside. The door was heavy, but she managed to get it open. Flandre looked around herself; it looked a bit like the Palace of the Earth Spirits. It was quite dark, it had a huge main hall and many balconies overlooking the hall with many dark corridors leading deeper within the fortress. Flandre started slowly walking forward. She couldn't say for sure, but she sensed that she wasn't alone. The place was completely polished, so all the light coming from the few candles here and there and the dim light coming from the gloomy sun of Makai, lit the place actually quite beautifully. Flandre walked a little bit deeper, but suddenly she heard someone saying: "Turn back, you have no business here..." Flandre looked around herself, but the sound was echoing through the stone walls so it was impossible to tell where the sound was coming from. Flandre decided to ignore the voice and head deeper.

After a while, Flandre reached the back of the main hall. There was this big double door. Flandre opened the doors and saw how it led to a dark corridor that had many doors on its sides. Flandre's senses sharpened; it was perfect place for ambush. She just gulped and started slowly walking forward. The corridor was relly long and dark without any light source. After Flandre had walked forward for almost two minutes, she suddenly heard a faint creaking sound behind her. She stopped immediately, took a deep breath and then without warning turned around and unleashed a massive shockwave of fire behind her from the tip of her Lävatein. Flandre felt a kick on her back and turned around again, but saw nothing. She then spinned around twice unleashing a waves of fire to the both directions. After she had stopped, she saw how someone dashed through one of the doors and ran towards her. The character was surprisingly fast and was holding a shiny sword in its hands. The character tried to hit Flandre with its sword, but Flandre was fast enough to go for block. The character didn't stop and instead of attacking, it dashed between Flandre's legs to behind her. Flandre turned around as fast as she could, but the mysterious character was faster and managed to thrust its sword right through Flandre's chest. Flandre flinched a little and then just looked down at the sword ponting from her chest and then at the mysterious person in front of her. Flandre's expression turned from shocked to confused as she slowly started pullling the sword out from her chest. When she finally got it out, she examined it carefully.

"This isn't silver..." She muttered out loud and then looked at her attacker with amused smile on her face.

Her attacker was a female. She had long wavy hair and was wearing a same kind of short sleeved maid outfit as Sakuya, but her attacker had red and white maid outfit instead of blue and white like sakuya did.

"It's very impolite to just thust a sword through your guest's chest, you know." Flandre said with sinister smile on her face and took a few steps towards the maid. The maid backed away a few steps.

"You have no right to be here! Be gone or you'll face my master's wrath!" The maid tried to intimidate Flandre, but Flandre just walked up to the maid and glared deep to the eyes of the maid. The maid tried to dash backwards and go for attack, but Flandre was ready for this and just simply grabbed the maid from her collars and lifted her in to the air. The maid tried to shake herself free, but Flandre just brought her little bit closer and whispered to her ear: "Your master wouldn't happen to be the creator of this land, would he or her?"

"I'll never betray her! I'll never betray Shinki!" The maid responded with furious and struggling tone. Flandre expression swithced from sinister grinn to unamused in one second as she looked at the maid.

"Well then, I'll take that as a yes." Flandre casually responded. She then lifted the sword that the maid had thrusted through her chest and with one swing, cut the maid's head off. She then dropped the body to the ground and picked up the maids loose head from the ground and looked at it.

"A little present for... Shinki, was it?" Flandre thought to herself and started to walk towards the end of the corridor while holding the head of that maid in her hands. She soon reached the end where there was this same kind of door as the one at the start of the corridor. Flandre took a deep breath and then slowly opened the door. Behind the door there was a huge open hall with many pillars on the sides and with beautiful back wall made of glass through which you could see the sun of Makai above the horizon. Before Flandre there were stairs leading to a higher platform that had really fancy looking throne on top of it and someone sitting on it.

"How dare you to enter m-" The person started but she was quickly interrupted by Flandre.

"SILENCE! I! AM! TALKING!" Flandre shouted at the person sitting on that throne and threw the head of that maid at the woman.

"I have one simple question: Where is Mima!?" Flandre shouted at the woman who was holding the head of the maid in her hands.

"Yumeko...?" The woman muttered to herself while looking at the head in her hands. She then lifted her gaze from the head and glared with hateful look at Flandre. The woman dropped the maid's head to the ground and at the exact moment when it hit the ground, the sun that could be seen throught the back wall window, grew ten time of its size and turned from orange to deep red. The woman then stomped the ground and in that instance the sun started to glow with unimaginably bright yellow light. Flandre then felt how the sun suddenly started to hurt like the sun back in Gensokyo. She groaned in pain and fell to all fours. The woman then started slowly descending the stairs towards Flandre with hate in her eyes.

"I am Shinki, the god of Makai and this is my fortress Pandemonium! Now, if you think that you can just come here, in to my domain, kill my creations and threaten me, I shall punish you with death!" Shinki said to Flandre with calm but furious tone. Shinki had red and black long sleeved robes. She had white long hair and six pale purple steel blade wings on her back which had red decorations on them.

Flandre tried to look for a shadow but there were none. She started to pant and breath heavily as the sun burned her skin and soul. Shinki just walked up to Flandre and made a sinister grinn. Then suddenly Flandre stood up and pushed Shinki away and pointed her hand towards the monstrous sun and then after few seconds squeezed her hand. There was a faint blink and then sun shrinked to a small dot on to the sky and then exploded with unimaginably tremendous force. The explosion created a huge shock wave and a fire storm that threw Flandre and Shinki straight to the wall of the throne hall. Flandre fell to the ground and breathed heavily on all fours. When Shinki fell to the ground she watched to the sky and saw how there was nothing left of the sun, just a red cloud of gas. Shinki then turned towards panting Flandre and without saying a word kicked her straight to the side wall. Flandre crushed few of those pillars on her way before hitting the wall.

"You come to my world, kill my my people and then insult me... Do you even comprehend what you're against here? I am god! You have no power here!" Shinki shouted at Flandre as she walked closer to her. Flandre forced herself to stand up and looked at Shinki. She coughed some blood out. She had let her self confidence to rise too high. She had underestimated Shinki very badly.

"A god you say? Heh, you're just... pant* ...a pretender. Tell me, how it feels, to pretend you're something that you're actually not?" Flandre said with tired and taunting grinn on her face. She knew that after that exposure to sun, she would have really hard time facing Shinki in open battle, so she had to think of a plan. Shinki's face was burning with rage as she ran up to Flandre and unleashed a massive beam straight to Flandre's stomach. Flandre groaned in pain as she was thrown at the wall by the power of Shinki's beam. Shinki then walked up to Flandre, grabbed her head and threw her against the throne in the middle of the room. As Flandre hit the ground and the throne, the whole throne was curshed in to splinters. Eevn after that hit Flandre managed to get up slowly, she chuckled a bit and and forced her dislocated leg back to its joint.

"Heh... pant* ...If you truly are what you clame to be, I'd suspect that you would be able to do better than that." Flandre said with taunting tone and strecthed her arms to her sides to bluster even more. Shinki then just pointed her hand towards Flandre and then immediately some sort of energy grabbed Flandre's legs and arms, so she couldn't move. Shinki then calmly walked up to Flandre with really unamused look on her face. She just glared deep int to Flandre's eyes, patted her head and said: "You really have some nerves..." After saying that, she charged her hand and with all her might, punched Flandre to her chest. The wave of energy, that it created, easily pirced Flandre, but this was her plan. Shinki then freed Flandre's limbs and she fell to her knees. Shinki then took one step backwards and readied her hand again. Then she swiped her hand towards Flandre and cut her right arm off, from just below her elbow. Blood was spurting everywhere as Flandre took step backwards and held her right arm in stooping position. But then suddenly she opened her eyes and all the blood on her stub of a hand turned as black and shiny as steel. The angle, in which Shinki had cut Flandre's hand and when Flandre hardened the blood on her stub, turned Flandre's hand in to a piercing bayonet. She then quickly swinged her new 'weapon' at Shinki's chest. Her attack was so fast and came out of nowhere that Shinki had no time to react. Flandre's attack went straight through Shinki's chest. Shen then lifted Shinki in to the air and punched her straight back to the ground. She repeated this almost ten times before stopping. She then leaned closer to badly mangled Shinki who was laying on her back, bleeding and Flandre's hand still through her chest. Flandre then hissed through her bloody teeth: "I'm not going to ask again, you mockery of a Seraphim; where, is, Mima!?" Shinki just whimpered a bit, coughed some blood out and pointed at some old ruins that could be seen in the distance through the glass wall.

"Go... gasp* ...to hell..." Shinki mumbled to Flandre.

"On my way..." Flandre responded to Shinki with sinister smile on her face and then ripped Shinki's body in half from her Pelvis. Flandre then ripped her arm from the bleeding chest of Shinki's upper body. Flandre saw that Shinki was still alive. She decided that she'll finish the job after she had acquired Marisa's soul and then looked at her right arm.

"It'll regnerate in few hours." She thought to her self and touched her bloody stub of a arm. She then walked towards the glass back wall. She was breathing heavily. The battle between her and Shinki was really brutal and depleting. She lost almost her whole arm and she now had even bigger hole going through her chest. Flandre just chuckled a bit as she held her chest and thought to herself: "This is one of those times when I'm thankful that I'm vampire..." She then reached the back wall. She just pointed her left hand towards the wall and blasted the wall in to millions of shards of glass. She then took off and headed towards those ruins that could be seen in the distance on a slope of a mountain.

From now on, Flandre had to be more careful. She didn't know how powerful Mima was, but now when she only had her left arm, she couldn't take any risks. She was quickly closing up to the ruins and as she got closer the more and more those ruins started to look like those ancient ruins in Greece that she had seen in books. While flying towards the ruins she got more and more worried about what she was going to encounter when she would enter the hell. She wasn't too worried about Mima. She finally reached the ruins and landed to a stone platform near the center of the ruins. She looked around herself. There was stony rubble everywhere and everything looked even older than the Fallen Temple where she had faced Sariel. She then saw this stony gateway that seemed to be the only thing intact. She walked closer to it and touched it.

"This must be it... The gateway to the Hell." Flandre muttered to herself as she touched the stony gateway.

"The girl has sharp mind..." Flandre suddenly heard someone saying from behind her. She turned around and saw a floating woman behind her. The woman had long green hair and blue cap on top of her head with yellow decorations. She had a purple ribbon on her neck and was holding a long wand that had crescent on its tip. She was wearing a light blue and green long dress with long sleeves and white symbols. She was also wearing a long cape that was blue on the outside and purple on the inside. She also had two demonic wings on her back which had the same color as the cape. But the strangest thing about her was that she had no legs and instead of legs, she had just white phantom like mist floating there where the legs were supposed to be.

"You're Mima, I suppose?" Flandre asked with serious tone.

"Yes and these are the Ruins of Vina. Who might you be?" Mima asked from Flandre with amused look on her face.

"You don't need to know who I am. You just need to open this gate." Flandre said and red glowing pentagram started spin under her feet to indicate that she was readying spell for a fight.

"Why would I?" Mima said with cunning tone. Her expression had switched from amused to serious.

"Because either way, I'm here to get revenge for Marisa." Flandre responded with threatening tone.

"Marisa? Well there's a name that I haven't heard in a long while. How is she doing now days?" Mima asked with curious look on her face. Flandre took long, hateful, but sad glare at Mima before answering: "She's dead, you know."

"Oh, what a shame. She was a really good student. Hmmh." Mima said with careless tone and shrugged her shoulders.

"How can you be so indifferent? You're the one who kept her from seeing her mother ever again and because of you, she died with being really bad terms with her family!" Flandre responded with hate in her eyes.

"So you think that I'm responsible for her death, hmmm? I see it in your eyes, you're the one who killed her in first place, aren't you." Mima said with accusatory grinn on her face. Flandre took a step backwards when she heard Mima's words.

"How did it feel, to kill your best friend?" Mima taunted Flandre and made a wide cunning grinn.

"H-how did you know that she was my best friend?" Flandre asked from taunting Mima.

"You make it obvious. You came all the way from Gensokyo to revive the one you have killed. Doesn't that give it away clearly enough?" Mima asked from Flandre and retained that cunning look on her face.

"I had no choice... She would have killed us all... But she deserves another change! The way she was treated was unjust!" Flandre said with determined look on her eyes.

"So now you come here and demand me to open the gate to Hell, so you can acquaire her soul and revive her, is that it? I'm afraid that I have to refuse. She was a failure. I taught her to wield magic so I could finally kill that pain of a shrine maiden, but she didn't manage to do so. That's why I don't have even slightest need to help you." Mima said and still retained taunting look on her face.

"No, you're wrong... Marisa killed Reimu few weeks ago... That's the main reason why Marisa had to be stopped. She couldn't control herself and was treated like shit because of that." Flandre said with shameful look on her face.

"Y-you mean, that after all these years...? After she became friends with Reimu...? S-she just simply butchers her best friend? Hehe... HeheheahahaHAHAAAAA! You know how ironic that is? Hahahaa! Me, Reimu's arch nemesis, can't find a way to kill her, but my failure subordinate can!? Woahahahahaaa!" Mima said and started to laugh out loud.

"No, I don't find that ironic at all. However, only thing I find ironic is that, if you are Reimu's arch nemesis, no wonder why you weren't able to defeat her." Flandre said and made a furious and a bit insane grinn on her face. Mima then backed away a little and watched Flandre with confused look on her face. Flandre just streched her arms to her sides and then out of nowhere, Flandre unleshed a massive, at least one hundred meter wide beam at Mima. Flandre had charged her spell the whole time that they were speaking. The beam continued for almost one minute before it wore off. Flandre then collapsed to her knees and breathed heavily.

"Villains... they always talk too much..." She muttered to herself, stood up and walked up to Mima's badly damaged body. The beam didn't kill her, but was enough to knock her out. Flandre just picked up the wand that Mima was holding in her hands.

"I bet that this will open the gate..." Flandre thought to herself and walked towards the stone gateway. She just looked at the wand and then at the gateway. She then pointed the wand at the gateway, closed her eyes and concentrated her mind. The wand started to glow and then it released a beam towards the gate. When the beam reached the gate, it looked like the beam hit the surface of water. The inside of the gateway started to glow in blue light and there were waves like it would be a surface of some lake. Flandre then lowered her hand and looked at the wand. Flandre then just simply crushed the wand into pieces.

"Wouldn't want her to close the gate while I'm in there..." She thought to herself, took a deep breath and without looking back, she walked through the gate. There was quick flash and then the world around Flandre changed again. Flandre felt how the air suddenly got really sultry. She looked around herself. She was in cave of some sort, but this definitely wasn't the Hell of Blazing Fires, no, this was different. She felt how the atmosphere was really unnerving and almost sad. The cave looked like the Hell of Blazing Fires. There was lava puring out of the walls and ceiling and there were stalagmites hanging from the ceiling and rising from the floor. The landscape was really rough, but surprisingly, Flandre didn't see anyone. She had thought that she would at least encounter some sort of creature or person when she would enter the Hell.

"Okay Marisa, you're here somewhere..." Flandre muttered and started to walk deeper in to the cave. It was really strange, she literally hadn't encountered any living or even dead being and it was making Flandre really nervous.

"Hmmm... Where are all the souls stored? That kind of information could help." Flandre thought to herself after walking forward for five minutes. Suddenly Flandre stopped. She saw a huge bronze disk just floating in front of her. The bronze disk was burning with purple ominous flames and it had picture of long haired a girl that was holding some sort of ball of light, carved to it.

"You... You do not belong here. Be gone! Living have no place in the domain of the dead." The bronze disk said with graceful and echoing voice.

"Well there's something you don't see every day, a flying dessert plate. Mind telling me, where I could find souls that are trapped in here?" Flandre asked with cunning tone.

"You do not belong here. Be gone!" The disk just simply answered.

"Yeah, you said that already, now where can I find Marisa." Flandre responded with indifferent tone.

"You do not belong here. Be gone!" The disk said for third time.

"You don't have your own consciousness, do you?" Flandre muttered and thought that she'll just walk past the bronze disk, but she was quickly stopped when the disk started to shoot lazers at Flandre. Luckily Flandre was qick enough to dodge. She jumped backwards and readied her Lävatein. She had to wield it in her left hand so it was a bit harder than it usually was, but she still managed to swing it pretty fiercely. Flandre hit the disk and the walls few times until she stopped swinging her sword. She just stood there and watched how the smoke slowly cleared away. The look on Flandre's face quickly turned from determined to shocked when she saw that her hits had no effect on the bronze disk. She then swinged her Lävatein at the disk few times more, but she quickly saw that her hits did no damage at all.

"I guess that now is good time to get lost." She muttered herself, took off from the ground and started to fly deeper in to the cave. The bronze disk charged after Flandre and kept shooting lazers at her.

"Arghh! What kind of being are you!?" Flandre shouted while trying to evade the pursuing disk and shot some lazers to slow the disk down, but the disk didn't even slow down when Flandre's projectiles hit its surface. Flandre figured that shooting at it was completely useless. She just tried to fly faster in the hopes of shaking that disk off. Flandre flied for few minutes while desperately trying to dodge the projectiles that it shot towards her.

"JUST GIVE UP ALREADY!" Flandre shouted and flied backwards so she could launch one of her spells against the disk.

"STAR BOW BREAK!" Flandre shouted furiously and then huge waves of colorful bullets flew from her body directly at the disk, but it didn't even slow it down. While flying backwards, Flandre didn't notice that there was this huge opening in the cave, and that she had just entered that opening. She was just about to turn around, when she suddenly hit one of those stalagmites that was hanging from the ceiling.

"Ahin!" Flandre whimpered after she had hit the stalagmite and fell to the ground. Flandre hit the ground quite hard, but she was lucky that she didn't get impailed by any of those stalagmites that were pointing from the floor. Flandre was holding her stub of a arm with her left arm, after she had recovered from the fall. She then quickly noticed that the disk was heading her way. She just tried to cover her head and prepared for the impact. There was deafening hollow sound of kettledrum and then it became silent. Flandre slowly lowered her hand from her face and saw how there was this huge wall of energy between her and the disk. It was now, when she noticed the opening that she was in. It was massive. The wall of energy was surrounding the whole area. In the middle of the opening there was a large hillock that had quite large building that looked like Shinto shrine, on top of it. Then After looking at the shrine for a while she noticed the ground; it was full of candles. There were literally at least millions if not even billions of candles and all of them had this greenish blue fire lit to them. Flandre slowly stood up and then turned around towards the disk.

"Looks like I'm in the right place... You can't go through this wall, can you?" Flandre said with careful, but still amazed tone. She then turned towards the shrine and started to walk towards it. In the middle of the candles there was this narrow path that lead to the shrine. She looked at the candles for a moment and then she suddenly heard something. She leaned closer to the candles and listened. She heard some silent whispers and appeals for help. It was coming from all candle. She then looked around herself, as she started to realize what the candles were.

"A-are all these candles souls?" She muttered to herself with unbelieving look on her face.

"Yes, they are." Flandre then heard someone saying from the direction of the shrine.

"It has been a long time since I've seen a living person within the realm of the dead. May I ask, what's your name?" The tall male character asked and walked along the path towards Flandre. The person had black semi long hair that was tied to a pony tail with a red ribbon. He had red robes with white trim, grey long sleeves and long katana hanging from his belt. The character also had long red horn on his forehead.

"I-I'm Flandre... Flandre Scarlet. Who are you? You don't look like Devil, for me at least." Flandre responded with curious and bit confused look on her face.

"Heh, Devil? No, no. There are many different hells, like the one back in Gensokyo, this and the one that Devil occupies. But no, I'm not the Devil. This is the Silent Shrine, my name is Konngara and this is the Shinto hell that is ruled by Yama, those powerful creatures that judge people after their death. I was commanded to look after this place and leave my Oni brothers and sisters behind. You're from Gensokyo, aren't you? I can smell it. Tell me, how is Yuugi doing now days?" Konngara asked with gentle smile on his face.

"Uhmm... I think she's doing pretty well. But... uhmm... You're Oni? Why were you commanded to look after this place?" Flandre asked with confused look on her face. She had never thought that she would encounter Oni on her journey to rescue Marisa.

"Yes, I am Oni. One of the 'Big Four' to be precise. We ruled over the Youkai Mountain, before we moved to the underground and swore to look after the Hell of Blazing Fires. Soon after that the Big Four split up. Two of us returned back to the above ground, Yuugi stayed at the Underground City and I decided to look after this place. Not that I had to, but because I wanted to. This place offers peace of mind and makes it easy to meditate. But please, tell me, why have you come here? This is pretty far away from Gensokyo, you must have some reason. You didn't come here to just talk to this old Oni, didn't you?" Konngara asked with fatherly tone from astonished Flandre.

"Uhmm... Yeah. I came here to recover my friend's, Marisa's soul back." Flandre said with humble tone.

"I see... You have gone through a lot, it seems." Konngara said and looked at bloodied Flandre, her lost arm, bloody clothes and injury in her chest.

"I'm sorry that you had trouble with Kikuri, that bronze disk. She is very protective when it comes to this place. But you made it here, so I wont stop you, but look around yourself. Your friend is just one of these hundreds of millions candles. How are you planning to find her?" Konngara said with fatherly but a bit sad tone. Flandre just looked around herself and realized that the job wasn't going to be easy.

"I wont ask, why she was sent here, to Hell, but if you bring her back with you, I'm sure that I don't need to warn you, that any of the Yamas wont be pleased and there will be people, who will want to sent her back to Hell. But if you manage to find her, you can have her. I haven't had a conversation with another living being for decades. It has been a pleasure." Konngara said and bowed towards Flandre. Flandre just nodded to indicate that she understood the situation and bowed back at Konngara. Konngara then just nodded and without saying a word, headed back to the Silent Shrine. Flandre then looked around herself again with determined look on her face. She had come all this way and wasn't going to give up now, even if it was going to take her years or even decades to find her.

"B-but how am I going to tell the difference between her and all other souls?" She thought to herself and the determination quickly switched to desperation. She had no clue how was she going to find Marisa's soul from omang the hundreds of millions other souls. Flandre just sat down in depression and thought.

"I was so close... Is this the part where I realize my failure?" She muttered to herself. She hadn't even noticed how badly she was injured before now.

"Wait... Injury!? THAT'S IT!" She suddenly yelled and stood up.

"Me and Marisa should have that telepathic connection even in death. If I hurt my self badly enough, maybe I'll get some sort of indication to tell me which one of these candles is Marisa." Flandre thought to herself and looked around herself. She didn't see anything that could help her in her 'self harming'. She then reached to her back, pulled out her Lävatein and looked at it.

"This'll have to do..." Flandre muttered while watching her sword that she was holding in her left arm. She then turned the sword so its tip pointed at her chest and she closed her eyes.

"Here goes nothing..." Flandre thought to herself and one single tear rolled from her closed eye. Then she forced the Lävatein through her body.

"AAAAAAHH!" Flandre shouted in pain and collapsed to her knees. Blood was spurting from her back and chest as she turned her Lävatein in her wound. She then opened her eyes, lifted her gaze from the ground and looked around herself. She didn't see any candle acting differently. She just looked at the sword that went through her chest and thought: "Not enough, eh?" She then charged her hand, squeezed the Lävatein even harder and in that moment the whole sword bursted in flames. Flandre was screaming in agony as the sword burned her insides. She looked around herself, but she still couldn't see any of the candles acting strangely. She then closed her eyes and ripped the Lävatein out from her chest. She couldn't withstand the pain any longer. She just stood there for few seconds breathing heavily and then she collapsed to the ground and started to cry out loud.

"What am I doing wrong!? What do I have to do to find you!?" Flandre yelled and punched the ground. Konngara was watching from the shrine as bleeding Flandre just cried on the ground. He felt sympathy towards Flandre.

"To come all this way and then just fail in the end..." He thought to himself with sad look on his face. But then he happened to look to Flandre's right and saw how one candle started to burn more intensily than the others. He then quickly stood up, walked up to the candle and picked it up carefully.

"What a day of happiness this is!" Konngara said and turned towards Flandre.

"Huh?" Flandre said after she had stood up and looked at Konngara with teary eyes and confused look on her face. Konngara then walked up to Flandre and gave the candle to her.

"Listen, could this be her?" Konngara said to Flandre and the look on Flandre's lightened up a bit. She brought the candle closer to her ear and listened carefully. She heard some faint whispering that said: "Good night mommy." Flandre's eyes bursted wide open when she heard those words. She started to cry from happiness, sat down and just watched the candle in her hands.

"You don't need to worry about accidentally extinguishing the fire. It actually cannot be quenched, even if you try. Wait here, I'll get you a lantern where you can easily carry her." Konngara said and walked to his shrine. Flandre just sat there silently and watched the candle in her hands. She couldn't belive that she had actually succeeded. That fire was Marisa and now she was really close to bring her friend back. Konngara soon returned and he was holding a tiny lantern in his hands. He walked up to Flandre, gave the lantern to her and said: "This lantern will keep her safe. You really should return to your own world now. The Hell really isn't too fitting place for living." Flandre quickly put the candle inside the lantern and then hugged Konngara.

"Thank you!" Flandre yelled with her eyes sparkling with joy. Konngara just smiled back at Flandre and patted her head.

"It has been a pleasure. But, before you go, I would like to ask a favor from you." Konngara said as Flandre let go of him.

"Sure, what ever I can do for you." Flandre responded and smiled at Konngara.

"Thank you. If you ever happen to see Yuugi, please give this to her." Konngara said and gave a some sort of scroll to Flandre. Flandre looked at the scroll for while and then put it in to her pocket.

"You don't need to say anything to her, the contents of the scroll will explain everything to her. Now go, I've commanded Kikuri to not to attack you and she'll quide you back to the gateway." Konngara said and waved a good-bye to Flandre who bowed with smile on her face and then started to walk towards the cave leading back to the gateway. Konngara then muttered something and the energy wall around the shrine and the candles wore off. Before Flandre reached the cave, she turned around looked at Konngara and waved to him with smile on her face. Then she turned around and vanished from Konngara's field of vision.

"I just hope that you have thought this through." Konngara thought to himself while walking back towards his shrine.

The walk back to the gateway didn't take too long and after Flandre finally saw the gateway and that it was still active and she sighed for relief. The lantern, that contained Marisa's soul was hanging from the ribbon that was tied to her back. Before stepping in to the gateway, she turned around once more and sighed for relief. Then she took a deep breth and stepped through the portal. There was again this quick flash and then she saw Makai in front of her again. She looked at the place where Mima was laying when she entered the Hell, but she wasn't there anymore.

"Yeah, you'd better run away..." Flandre thought to herself before taking off towards the Pandemonium. She had promised to Sariel, that she'll finish Shinki off and she was planning to do that before she would leave Makai. The journey to the city and the fortress didn't take too long. When Flandre finally reched the Pandemonium she immediately flew inside from the broken glass back wall that she had blown up. She looked around herself and saw that Shinki was still laying there. She had dragged herself next to the nearest pillar and was leaneing against it. Flandre saw this clearly because there was this trail of blood leading back to where she left Shinki in the first place. She then slowly walked up to Shinki and just watched as she just laid there, bleeding and panting. Shinki just glared at Flandre with hate in her eyes and blood dripping from her mouth. Flandre then readied her Lävatein and without saying a word, pierced Shinki's head with it. There was long silence as Flandre just pulled her sword out and watched how Shinkis torso just tumbled to the floor. But then suddenly the whole Pandemonium and whole Makai started to tremble and fall apart.

"Whoa... Luckily I didn't kill her before entering the Hell..." Flandre thought to herself and searched through her pockets for that amulet as pieces of stone started to fall from the ceiling. She pulled out the amulet, that Byakuren had given her back in Gensokyo and looked at it.

"This has to work..." Flandre thought to herself and started to pour energy from her hand to the amulet. Then a scray thought creeped in to her mind: "What if I materialize in the middle of some meadow or something in the middle of a day?" Flandre thought about that for few seconds, but then a huge stone almost fell on her and she was just barely able to dodge.

"Well even that is better than dying here after all this. Here goes nothing..." She muttered to herself and concentrated her mind to the amulet. Then the world around her started to glow and in a quick flash, she switched dimensions once again.

The flash blinded Flandre for second, but she felt great felief when she felt soft grass under her feet. When her vision returned she immediately looked around herself. There were few trees here and there and she saw the Scarlet Devil Mansion slightly to her left, down below her.

"Wait, below? Where am I?" She thought to herself in confusion. She then looked behind herself and saw the top of the Youkai Mountain. She was standing on the slope of the mountain. Then she happened to look up and saw that it was day. She gulped, but as soon as she realized that she was standing on the shadowy side of the mountain, she sighed for felief. It seemed that it was morning because she was standing on the western slope of the mountain and it was quite shadowy. She decided to head down and try to find some place where she could wait for the evening so she could finally return home. She would need to find place where she could be safe from the sun before midday when the sun shines almost directly above. She started quickly descending the mountain. It became quite misty when she got to the lower parts of the mountain. She started to get worried that she might get lost in that mist and because it seemed that the forest too was getting thicker and thicker. She had walked for fifteen minutes when she suddenly came across quite open area in the middle of the forest. It seemed quite strange. The mist made it almost impossible to see, but Flandre was just barely able to see some large shadow in the middle of that area. She walked a little bit closer, and when she realized what that shadow was she was quite surprised. It was this large oriental styled mansion in the middle of the forest. Flandre had no idea who owned the place, but she decided to try ask for shelter. It seemed that this was her best chance. Flandre then walked up to the mansion's door and knocked. There was no response, so Flandre decide to knock again, but still no one came to open. Flandre then tried to open the door; it wasn't locked. Flandre thought, that maybe it wouldn't hurt to spend her day here. When the owner returns, she could just explain the situation. She then stepped inside and closed the door behind herself.

Flandre looked around herself. The mansion seemed to belong to a Taoist, or at least that's what she figured from the decoration style. Shen then looked through rooms until she found a room that had a futon in it. Flandre hadn't slept since the journey to Makai, so she was quite tired.

"Yaawn* I'll just sleep here for a moment and wait for the night time." Flandre thought and layed down on to the futon. It was so comfortable, so warm and soft. She fell asleep almost immediately with gentle smile on her face, because she knew that she had succeeded in saving Marisa.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Marisa asked from Flandre beside her. They were sitting on sandy beach and before them was a beatiful sea view.

"Where are we? Why are we here?" Flandre asked with confused tone. There were no oceans in Gensokyo. She looked at Marisa; she had no wings and her eyes had their normal bright yellow color.

"Does it matter, where we are? I wanted to tell you something." Marisa said and looked at Flandre with smiling face.

"What is it?" Flandre asked from smiling Marisa who turned her head towards the ocean and looked to the horizon.

"I'm gonna have to leave soon..." Marisa said with expressionless face.

"Where? I want to come with you." Flandre said with confused look on her face.

"You can't." Marisa responded with serious tone.

"Why not? I don't want to abandon you ever again." Flandre insisted. She didn't know what was going on.

"Don't worry, you never did, but promise me one thing. When I'm gone, please don't ever forget about me." Marisa said and looked at Flandre with serious face.

"No I'll never forget about you, never." Flandre said with confused tone to Marisa who cracked a sad smile on to her face. Flandre then leaned closer to Marisa and hugged her.

"I wont forget about you..." Flandre muttered while hugging her friend.

Then suddenly, Flandre woke up. She looked around herself and then herself. She realized that she was wearing pajamas. She palpated her chest and felt that there was a piece of cloth wrapped around it. She then looked at her right arm to see that it had almost fully regnerated while she slept. She then looked to her left. The scroll that she had in her pocket and the lantern were on top of a drawer. Her skirt, vest, shirt and mob cap had been patched and were finely folded next to her. She then smelled a tea. It seemed that the owner of this mansion had taken care of her. She quickly stood up, got dressed and put the scroll to her pocket and attached the lantern to her ribbon. She then stepped out from the room and looked around herself. She headed towards the living quarters to find out, who was the one who took care of her.

"Oh, you're finally awake. Good." Flandre heard someone saying from the kitchen. Then Kasen stepped out from the kitchen.

"I was visiting Akyuu at the Hakurei shrine during the morning and when I returned, I found you sleeping in here. You were really badly wounded, so I took care of you and reapired your clothes. Akyuu said that you've gone missing. Where were you?" Kasen asked while holding a teapot in her hands.

Kasen had shoulder-length pale pink hair with Chinese-styled double buns. Her right arm was wrapped in pandages. She was wearing a white shirt and green skirt, over those a brown front panel that has thorny vine motif and large rose-shaped ornament just below her collar level. She also had a shackle on her left wrist. She claimed that she was a hermit, but everyone very well knew that she wasn't what she claimed to be. Though no one knew what she really was.

"Thanks. I was in Makai. I wanted to get revenge for Marisa, because Mima had kept her from seeing her family." Flandre responded and sat down to her knees on to a nearby mat.

"Well you looked like you had been in a serious fight." Kasen responded with serious tone and poured some tea for herself and Flandre.

"Well there were more than one battle..." Flandre said while drinking her tea.

"Sigh* I just hope that it was worth it. Your sister, as far as I've heard, has been really worried." Kasen said and kept that serious look on her face.

"Yes, it was worth it. I can finally have peace of mind when I know that I've avenged Marisa." Flandre responded and cracked a gentle smile.

"Good to hear that. I think that you should head home soon. The sun has already set and I bet that everyone in Scarlet Devil Mansion are worried." Kasen said with a bit more relaxed tone. Flandre then finished her tea and stood up.

"Thanks for taking care of me. I'll head home now." Flandre said and bowed for Kasen. Kasen nodded, cracked a gentle smile and waved a good-bye for Flandre as she walked through the door and to outside. Kasen then finished her own tea and pulled a piece of paper from her pocket and looked at it. She had made a copy of that sigil that was on that scroll that Flandre had.

"It has been a long time since I saw this last time. Where, oh where did you get this Flandre?" She muttered to herself while looking at the sigil.

Meanwhile Flandre had already taken off and was heading towards the Scarlet Devil Mansion. She was completely oblivious about the fact that Kasen had recognized that scroll she had gotten from Konngara. She was just happily flying back to her home while knowing that Mima had been destroyed along side Makai and she would soon be able to revive Marisa. The mansion wasn't too far away, so it didn't take too long till Flandre arrived to the gates of the Scarlet Devil Mansion. She immediately saw how Meiling was, as ususal, sleeping in front of the gates. Flandre made a cunning grinn as she walked up to Meiling. She then got up to her toes, so she could reach Meiling's ear. She then whispered to her ear: "Slacking off again, I see?"

"Uh-uhmmm... ABSOLUTELY NO, Sakuya!" Meiling yelled when she woke up and saluted. Flandre just fell to her back and bursted out laughing. Meiling then realized that the one who woke her up wasn't Sakuya, but Flandre.

"Oh, thank the god, young mistress! You've finally returned!" Meiling yelled with relieved tone as she helped Flandre to get up.

"We were so worried when we didn't find you from your room." Meiling said to Flandre with gentle smile on her face as they started to walk towards the mansion's front door.

"Nah, you shouldn't have. You should have been worried about those who got on my way." Flandre respnded happily and grinned.

"Heh, we should have known tha... Oh my, what happened to your arm?" Meiling asked with worried tone when she finally noticed the injury in Flandre's right arm.

"As I said, those who got on my way..." Flandre responded casually and shrugged her shoulders.

"Sigh* Well at least you're home now. Come, I bet that your sister is relieved when she sees that you've returned." Meiling said to Flandre as she opened the mansion's front doors. When Flandre stepped inside she was immediately greeted by Koakuma and bunch of fairy maids who were passing through the lobby.

"Oh, young mistress, you've finally returned. I'll inform Remilia and Sakuya immediately." Koakuma said when she saw that Meiling was accompanied by Flandre. Koakuma then immediately flew deeper in to the mansion to tell that Flandre had returned and that she was alive and well.

"Oh, Flandre. Good to see you've made it back." Patchouli said when she entered the lobby.

"Aww, come on now. Why is everyone so surprised that I'm alive?" Flandre said with almost disappointed look on her face.

"Makai is a dangerous place. You shouldn't have gone there. Who knows what could have happened." Patchouli said with caring and a bit more relieved tone.

"No need to worry. I avenged Marisa and got back alive. That's that." Flandre said with careless tone and shrugged her shoulders. When Flandre did that, Patchouli finally noticed Flandre's right arm. She immediately walked up to Flandre and examined her.

"Sigh* This is exactly what I was talking about. You really took some serious damage." Patchouli said after she had examined Flandre's arm and the wound on her chest.

"Better not to tell them that Makai doesn't exist anymore." Flandre thought to herself after she had gotten her shirt and vest back on.

"Flan!" Remilia yelled when she finally arrived to the lobby and immediately ran up to Flandre and hugged her. Sakuya followed just behind Remilia with relieved look on her face.

"Thank goodness, you've returned. I assume that you did what you were going to do, am I right?" Remilia said after she had let go of Flandre.

"Beating Mima up? Yep." Flandre responded with proud look on her face.

"Well, I was going to stop you from doing so before you left, but now when it's done, tell me, how did you spread our familys name? How did the battle go?" Remilia asked with curious and enthused tone. Flandre then chuckled a bit and made a sinister grinn.

"One shot..." She said with sinisterly cute tone.

"That's my sister!" Remilia responded with smiling face.

"Milady, you shouldn't encourage her to do those kinds of things in the future." Sakuya said to remilia with refined tone and gentle smile on her face.

"By the way Flandre, if the battle between you and Mima was so easy, why all those injuries?" Sakuya continued with curious look on her face.

"Uhmm... You know, had to persuade Shinki to tell me Mima's location." Flandre said and scratched her head.

"By the way, when are we going to have dinner? I'm hungry." Flandre said and held her belly. Sakuya then signed Flandre to follow her to the kitchen. Flandre ate like never before. She had not eaten for two days straight so she had enormous hunger. After eating, she went to her room to get some rest. She kept Konngara's scroll in her pocket for in case she met Yuugi, but Marisa's lantern she put into her drawer, so she wouldn't lose it.

"So if what Akyuu said was the truth, this boy in the human village should be friends with Rumia. If he could get Marisa's brother to come and meet me, I bet that I could persuade him to help me to revive Marisa." Flandre muttered to herself while watching that lantern. She then put it into the drawer and closed it. She would need to think about, how she was going to convince Marisa's brother to help her. She was just sitting on her bed when Meiling opened the door and stepped into her room and looked around herself.

"Are you looking for something?" Flandre asked with confused tone from Meiling. Meiling too seemed as confused as Flandre.

"Uhhhmm... Not exactly looking for anything, more like someone..." Meiling said with hesitant tone.

"Wh-what do you mean?" Flandre asked with even more confused tone. Meiling then stopped, looked at Flandre and sighed.

"Uhmm, I don't know how to say this, but... sigh* ...I could swear that I sensed Marisa's Qi for a second." Meiling said with serious tone. Flandre looked at Meiling for a moment and then made a really unamused look on to her face.

"That's not funny." Flandre said with grievous tone.

"I know, I'm sorry, but... Ehhh, forget it." Meiling said and bowed to Flandre with apologizing look on her face and then walked out and closed the door behind her. Flandre waited for moment to make sure that there were no one in the vicinity of her. She then sighed for relief when she was sure that Meiling had gone.

"Phew* That was close. I really need to revive her as soon as possible or Meiling might find out what I'm doing." Flandre thought to herself before starting to switch on her pajamas. The morning was about to come and she was quite tired. She had decided that she'll wake up as early as possible in the evening, go out and find Rumia. She needed Marisa's brother's help really badly. She knew that in the worst scenario she would need to use brute force to convince him to help her, because Marisa's revival wasn't going to be possible otherwise. She just tried to stay positive and relax. Tomorrow she would finally correct the mistake that was made over four weeks back.

"MARISAAAAH! WHERE ARE YOUUU!?" Flandre yelled while flying burning Gensokyo below her. The sky wasn't visible and the smell was terrible. There were corpses everywhere in the flames and it almost seemed that some of them were still alive. Flandre had no idea what was going on. The only thing she knew was that she had to find Marisa. She kept on flying and yelling Marisa's name, but there was no response. Suddenly Flandre saw a really shiny flash which drained all her energy. It didn't necessarily hurt her, but it forced her to land.

"Awww, shit, this can't be good..." Flandre muttered and started to run through the flaming forest to the direction where she saw the flash. After running through the forest and dodging every single disgusting corpse, Flandre finally reached the scene.

"MARISAA!" Flandre yelled when she saw Marisa laying on the ground and Reimu standing before her. Reimu then leaned closer to Marisa, grabbed her head with her left hand and with her right hand, took three serrated needles out from her pocket.

"Oh, no you don't..." Flandre muttered with furious tone and pointed her hand at Reimu. She then unleashed a bright beam of energy towards Reimu which knocked her off from on top of Marisa. Flandre then walked up to Reimu, grabbed her from her collars and lifted her in to the air. Reimu just looked at furious Flandre with frantic look on her face and tried to get off from Flandre's grip. Flandre just looked at Reimu for a second, but then she realized that Reimu wasn't looking at her, but she was actually looking behind her. She quickly released Reimu and turned around. She saw how Marisa had stood up and was looking furious. Marisa the dashed towards Flandre and pressed her to the ground. Marisa was holding Flandre in place with her left hand as she slowly readied her right arm.

"M-Marisa!? Ughh... What are you doing!?" Flandre shouted while trying to kick Marisa off. Marisa just silently looked at Flandre and then her deep yellow eyes turned to deep red and pair of huge bat-like wings grew from her back. She then hissed to Flandre with rage burning in her eyes: "You did this to me!" She then charged her hand towards Flandre with tremendous force, but before she could hit Flandre, Flandre sat up.

Flandre looked around herself. She was in her bed breathing heavily and sweating. She then sighed for relief when she realized that it had been just a dream. She then looked to her left, opened her drawer and looked at the lantern that was glowing with greenish light.

"Try to understand, it wasn't my fault. We were just bit too careless, but don't worry. When I have revived you, we will find a way to cure you, I promise." Flandre said with compassionate and motherly tone like Marisa could hear her. She then looked at the clock. It was seven in the evening. A perfect timing. She should head out immediately and find Rumia. Flandre got dressed up and headed out from her room. She left Marisa's lantern into her drawer, so she wouldn't lose it. She headed straight to the lobby. The sun had sat low enough, so she wouldn't need to take parasol with her. It was so early that the only one who was up beside Flandre was Sakuya, who was cleaning the lobby at the time. Flandre walked up to Sakuya and said: "Hey, I'm heading out. If anyone asks where I am, can you tell them?"

"Huh? Oh, of course. If I may ask, why are you heading out this early? The sun has just barely sat down." Sakuya asked with gentle tone.

"I'm not up to anything. I just wanted to take a walk through the forest and maby visit the Myouren Temple and thank Byakuren for helping me to get to Makai." Flandre said with casual tone.

"Well, I don't think that there would be any harm in it, so you can go. Just don't vanish like last time and if you can, come back before dinner." Sakuya responded with motherly tone.

"Yeah, I'll try." Flandre said and waved a good-bye for Sakuya as she walked through the main doors. It was late evening. The sky was beautifully orange and warm wind felt nice. Flandre then took off and headed straight to the Forest of Magic. The forest was the most likely place where she would find Rumia. Flandre flew straight over the lake and in to the forest. She knew that weak youkai were ususally seen nearby the human village, so she decided to look there. When Flandre could see the lights of human village, she landed to the ground and proceeded by foot. She knew also that Rumia was the youkai that ate the biggest number of humans out of all, so she found it pretty impressive that this human boy was able to become friends with Rumia. Flandre then stopped and started to listen. Rumia was the youkai of darkness, so trying to have visual contact to her wasn't the greatest idea. After a while Flandre heard some distant talking. She couldn't tell if that was the Rumia's voice, but she decided to make sure. She headed towards the source of that voice and when she got to it she was quite surprised. Flandre saw how some human kid was just leaning towards the tree with his eyes closed and counting to ten. Flandre recognized a youkai when she saw one and that was definetly not youkai.

"Hey kid, you know that it's dangerous for humans to be out during this time." Flandre said with casual tone. The boy immediately freaked, jumped and turned around. The boy immediately took a few steps backwards and looked around himself like looking for a way out. Flandre then realized that this actually might be the boy who became friends with Rumia. Why else would he be here?

"Hey no need to panic. I'm not here to kill you or anything. Are you the one who became friends with rumia? If yes, I was actually looking for you." Flandre said to that boy and made a gentle smile.

"Y-yeah, that's me. W-why are you looking for me?" Yana asked with distrustful tone and look on his face. Flandre didn't get to answer before Rumia arrived to the scene. Rumia and Yana were playing hide'n seek and Rumia had started to wonder, what stopped Yana from counting.

"Oh, the vampire? What was your name again, I can't remember? What are you doing here?" Rumia asked with curious tone. Yana then walked closer to Rumia where he felt a bit safer.

"It's Flandre and I was looking for you two actually." Flandre responded with a bit annoyed look on her face.

"But you still haven't told, why exactly." Yana said with still a bit scared tone. He very well knew that Flandre was a vampire and that made him really distrustful.

"I've heard that you've wanted to revive Marisa, am I right?" Flandre asked with serious tone.

"Y-yeah. How so?" Yana responded with a bit braver tone.

"Well, Marisa was my dear friend and I myself have tried to revive her too and I'm really close already, but I need your help." Flandre said and looked at Yana with dead serious face.

"H-how I can be sure that I can trust you?" Yana responded with doubtful look on his face.

"Well, if you don't want to help me..." Flandre said with sly tone and shrugged her shoulders.

"Wait! sigh* What kind of help do you need?" Yana quickly corrected himself.

"Good, good. I just want you to know that I'm not your enemy and I don't want to harm you or anybody else. The thing I need you to do is to get Marisa's brother somehow to come here with you and Rumia. I don't care how you do that, but if you're able to do that, I'm quite sure that I can convince him to help us to revive Marisa." Flandre explained with serious look on her face.

"O-okay... When and where am I supposed to bring him?" Yana asked with careful tone.

"If possible, next evening to this same place. I'll be waiting for you in here." Flandre responded with a gentle smile on her face.

"Okay, I'll help you. I can't promise anything, but I'll do my best." Yana responded to nodding Flandre. Flandre then bowed and took off. Yana stayed still for moment. It took him a moment to understand that he was actually helping this vampire to revive Marisa. Everything just happened so quickly. Yana remembered what Yukari had said to him, but now when he was offered a change to revive Marisa, he wanted to do everything he could to help.

Yana and Rumia kept playing hide'n seek for hour or two before Yana returned to the village. Sneaking out and back in to the village turned out to be quite easy. Yana sneaked back in to his family's home and went to sleep. But when he layed on his bed, he just couldn't get the thought that he was actually helping a real vampire to revive Marisa and he had quite important role in it, out of his head. Yana was really excited about the whole thing. It took him a while, but eventually he fell asleep.

It was a beautiful morning when Yana was walking to school. He was a bit tired, but that wasn't going to stop him. He knew that Marisa's brother was one of the oldest students in Keine's school. After the school day is over, he would go and talk to him. Yana was sure that he would be able to convince Marisa's brother to come with her. He thought that if Marisa's brother hadn't known her sister very well, he would want to meet her again.

When Yana entered his class, he casually sat down on to his place and looked around himself. He saw that Marisa's brother was sitting at the back of the class like always. Marisa's brother wasn't the most social kid in the school and didn't usually hang out with anybody. Keine then soon entered the class and the school day proceeded like any other.

Keine teached mostly history, but she also teached a fair amount of other subjects as well. Keine was actually so well informed about the historical events and people, that some humans had started to think that Keine got most of her information from Akyuu, who remembered everything when she once saw it. The school day passed by as slowly as ever, but eventually the bell rang last time to indicate that the school had ended. Yana's heart skipped a beat when he heard the bell ringing. He knew that now was his time to shine, so he packed his things as fast as he could and headed out to wait for Marisa's brother. He sat on the stairs for quite some time because Marisa's brother was usally the last one to leave the school building, but eventually he too stepped out. Yana then quickly stood up and walked up to Marisa's brother.

"Hey, Kai! Would you have time to talk?" Yana asked with curious tone.

"Eeehhh, sure whatever. What's in your mind?" Kai asked with indifferent tone and look on his face.

"Thanks. Uhmm, I don't know how to ask this, but how do you feel... about your sister?" Yana asked with careful tone while walking beside Kai.

"I don't really want to talk about it. Why do you ask?" Kai responded with serious look on his face.

"I would like to hear your opinion about it. I've heard that you didn't even know that you had sister." Yana asnwered with compassionate tone.

"Sigh* You're right. I got to know about her existance when Keine came to our house and told my father that she had turned into vampire. My father hadn't even told that I had a sister. I think that I would have never even gotten to know, if Keine hadn't said it while I was listening. I demanded that my father and I would go and see Marisa because vampire or not, I wanted to meet my sister. When we got to her house, I was shocked. My father treated her like she would not be his daughter any more. I felt pity for her. To be mocked like that by your own father. It was even more heart breaking when my father barely even reacted when Keine told that Marisa had died." Kai explained with sad look in his face. Yana just silently listened to him. He finally understood how Kai felt.

"I'm sorry to hear that." Yana said with compassionate tone.

"Sigh* Well, it's good to hear that even someone cares about what happened to her. It feels good to talk." Kai responded with faint smile on his face.

"If you would get a change to meet your sister again, would take that change?" Yana asked with careful tone.

"Truth be told, I would. I don't care what Yukari says. I never got to know my sister, but I would want to give her a change. I don't care if she became youkai or not, she still was my sister." Kai said with determined spark in his eyes. Yana then stopped and grabbed Kai's sleeve and whispered to his ear: "Come, quick." Yana then pulled Kai to the space between the houses, so they wouldn't be heard. When Yana was sure that there was nobody in vicinity of them he turned towards Kai with serious look on his face.

"You said that you'd take the change to revive Marisa, right?" Yana asked with serious tone and look on his face.

"Huh? I appreciate that you talked with me, butI don't have time to play any games." Kai answered with confused look on his face.

"No listen. I too wanted to know why Yukari wont allow Reimu's revival, so this one night I sneaked out to get to the Hakurei shrine and ask from her personally. On my way there I managed to become friends with this certain youkai of darkness or something. I didn't get Yukari to change her mind but, after that I've actually sneaked out a few times already to play with this youkai. But last time when I did this, a vampire, I believe the one from the Scarlet Devil Mansion, came and told me that she was looking to revive Marisa, but she would need YOUR help. She asked me to get you to help her." Yana explained with determined spark in his eyes.

"Haahaa, very funny. That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard." Kai said with indifferent tone and chuckled a bit.

"You said that, if you were offered a change to revive your sister, you would take it. I too want to revive her. I think that she deserves a second change. I know how ridiculous this all seems, but please, you just have to believe me." Yana said with serious look on his face. Kai just laughed a bit and looked at Yana, but his face switched from amused to serious pretty quickly when he realized that Yana wasn't joking.

"Y-you're serious, aren't you? What makes you believe, that that vampire, Remilia was it, isn't going to betray you?" Kai asked with much more serious tone.

"No, it was her younger sister, Flandre, if I remember her name correctly. As far as I know, Flandre and Marisa were really close friends. Why would she betray me?" Yana answered with assured tone and look on his face. Kai just looked at his feet with doubtful look on his face.

"This is the only change you'll ever get to know your sister. Think about it." Yana continued.

"Ehhhrr... Fuck it! If this is going to be the only change to get to know my sister, I'll take it. Be it suspicious or not. Sigh* So how do we have to help her?" Kai asked with determined look in his eyes.

"I don't know exactly, but she told us to come to the same place where I met her, in this evening. She will tell you the rest." Yana said with preoccupied look on his face.

"I admit that this sounds pretty shady, but I'll trust you that you're not leading us in to a trap." Kai said with serious tone and then nodded to Yana.

"Meet me after nine in this same place in the evening and we'll get going." Yana said to nodding Kai with seroius face before he walked out from the alley. Yana then quickly followed and headed home. He had succeeded in getting Kai to come with him. He couldn't wait for the evening, so they could revive Marisa. Yana walked home and went to his room to wait for the evening. Yana could hear how his dad was nagging how that red youkai that flew over the village was a bad omen and something ver, very bad was about to happen. Yana just thought that his dad was too paranoid. He thought that, if he had become friends with Rumia so easily that one youkai that flying over the town couldn't be so bad thing. Yana really didn't have a plan how, they were going to sneak out from the village. In fact he didn't need one. It had turned out to be much more easier than he had thought on the first time. He had discovered that on the west side of the town, there was this hay cart parked near the wall. By climing on top of it, it was easy to get out from the town without being noticed.

It was boring to wait for almost five hours, but finally his family went to sleep. Yana then quietly stepped out from his room and headed outside. Many houses still had lights on, but luckily there didn't seem to be anyone on the streets. Yana then headed straight to their rendezvous. He really hoped that Kai hadn't gotten any second thoughts. It didn't take long until he arrived to the place where they were supposed to meet. He entered the alley and saw Kai leaning against the wall.

"I'm here as I promised. So how are we going to sneak out?" Kai asked when he noticed that Yana had finally arrived.

"Follow me." Yana said after looking around himself to make sure that they were alone. Without uttering even a single word, they headed through the village to its west side until they reached the wall.

"So, what now? Kai asked while looking at the wall.

"We'll use this." Yana said and pointed at the cart to their right and sterted to climb on top of it.

"By the way, why are you carrying that backpack?" Kai asked while climbing on top of the cart.

"I have food here. Rumia is my friend, but I always carry food with me just in case. Youkai is still youkai after all. We'll need her protection if we want to travel safely through the forest." Yana explained when he got on top of the wall.

"Good thinking." Kai responded after he too got on top. They then jumped down. Kai looked around himself with nervous look on his face.

"So where is this 'youkai friend' of your's?" Kai asked with nervous tone. He had visited the forest only few times before, but never during the night, so no wonder why he was a bit scared.

"We need to get a little bit deeper in to the forest before I can call her. Wouldn't want to wake up the whole village." Yana said and signed Kai to follow him. They walked about two hundred meters before Yana thought that they were far enough from the village so he could call Rumia. Yana then made a high-pitched whistle. They just stood still and waited for a while. After waiting for a while, they saw how a face of a small girl peeked from behind the tree. Yana then waved at the girl and walked up to her. Kai just stood still and watched.

"Here." Yana said and gave the food that he was carrying to Rumia. Rumia then immediately started eating it and while doing so, she looked at Kai with curious look on her face.

"Who's this now?" Rumia asked with mouth full.

"He's the one I needed to come with me. Can you lead us to the place where we saw that vampire yesterday?" Yana asked from eating Rumia.

"Sure." Rumia responded with smile on her face after she had finished her meal. She then stood up, rose few meters above the ground and started slowly floating to the direction where they met Flandre. Yana and Kai followed her.

"So what do you think?" Yana asked from Kai with proud look on his face.

"Impressive. But I didn't come here to watch some youkai show. The sooner we get this over with the better." Kai said with astonished but serious face. Yana just looked at Kai and nodded. The place where they had met Flandre wasn't too far, so the journey didn't take too long. After walking for about five minutes they reached a small opening in the forest and saw a small figure standing in the middle of it. It was Flandre. Yana took a step forward so Flandre could see their arrival. Kai followed Yana's lead, but seeing Flandre didn't make him feel any safer, but he couldn't back away now.

"Ah, you're finally here. And I assume that you're Marisa's brother." Flandre said after she had noticed Yana, Kai and Rumia arriving. Flandre took a step forward to take a better look at Kai.

"Y-yes, I'm her brother. My name is Kai." Kai said to Flandre with diffident look on his face.

"Good, good. My name is Flandre. I assume that you've understood the gravity of the situation by now. We are gonna revive her this night." Flandre said with determined look on her face.

"Okay. What do I need to do, how are we going to revive her?" Kai asked from Flandre who turned around.

"First things first. We need to get to her body. Her grave's location isn't known in public and I'm one of the few who know where she's buried. The grave's location is on the far side of Gensokyo. Walking there would take us too long so we need to fly." Flandre said, turned around and looked at Rumia.

"F-fly? Me and Yana are just ordinary humans. We can't fly." Kai responded with confused tone.

"That's why me and Rumia have to carry you two. Don't worry it's completely safe." Flandre responded and looked at confused Rumia.

"Ehh... I'm completely okay, even if it's going to take us hours till we get there by foot." Kai responded with unwelcoming tone.

"But I'm not. It's going to be morning till we get there and I can't revive her during the day. We have to carry you. Rumia, please come here." Flandre said and signed Rumia to come closer.

"You've spent more time with Rumia, so I assume that you trust her more than you do me, so I'll carry you Yana." Flandre said and showed to Rumia how to carry Kai properly. Flandre then walked up to Yana and grabbed him by his waist and then rose from the ground. Flandre then signed Rumia to do the same. As soon as they both had taken off, they headed west where Marisa's grave was.

"Oh gods..." Kai muttered while looking down. He didn't like the fact how helpless he was. He just tried to not think about the fact that he was carried by a real youkai and if that youkai decided to eat him there would be nothing he could do about it.

"Wohooo! This is awesome!" Yana yelled while looking at the Gensokyo below them.

"H-how can you be so carefree about this?" Kai asked with almost panicking tone.

"The kid is brave. No wonder why Yukari said that he would become a good youkai hunter someday." Flandre said to freaked Kai with calm tone.

"Don't worry, it wont take too long until we arrive to our destination." Flandre continued with gentle smile on her face. They flew for about twenty minutes towards the west end of Gensokyo before Flandre stopped and signed Rumia to stop too. They then started slowly to descend to the ground. They were on top of large forest. Neither Yana or Kai had ever seen this far reaches of Gensokyo. When they finally landed they looked around themselves. It was quiet, really quiet. They couldn't even hear the sound of the crickets. Flandre then signed them to follow her.

"Come, it's just few dozen meters from here." Flandre said while walking towards a small opening in the forest. They followed Flandre and as soon as they reached the opening, they saw a small gravestone in the middle of it. The ground in front of the gravestone had been dug and a fairly sized white wooden coffin was laying next to the gravestone.

"I dag her out after I had talked with you yesterday." Flandre said while looking at the coffin with empty look on her face.

"I-is this it? Is this Marisa's grave?" Kai asked while walking towards the grave and the coffin. He looked at the gravestone. The name 'Marisa Kirisame' was written to it. Kai then turned towards the coffin and touched it.

"What now?" Kai aske and looked at Flandre with a bit sad look on his face. Flandre then walked up to the coffin and looked Kai.

"Say hello to your sister." Flandre said with sad smile on her face. She then grabbed the lock on the side of the coffin and ripped it off. She then opened the coffin gently. There she layed, Marisa. She hadn't changed at all. Her face and body looked as lively as ever. One could even think that she was only sleeping. Marisa was still a vampire so her body wouldn't rot. Flandre leaned closer and touched Marisa's chest. She could still feel the stab wound under her clothes.

"Could you give me a hand? Let's lift her out." Flandre said to Kai and they lifted Marisa out from the coffin and lowered her gently to the ground. Yana and Rumia just silently watched in the backround.

"So how are we going to revive her?" Kai asked and looked at Flandre.

"This is where I'm going to need your help. I need some of your blood." Flandre said with serious tone and looked at Kai. Kai then gulped, took a step backwards and held his neck.

"I-is it safe? I-I mean..." Kai stuttered in shock.

"Wh-oh no, no, no. You got it all wrong. I don't need to suck your blood. I just need a small sample sample of your blood. You and Marisa share the same mixture of your father's and mother's blood." Flandre explained to Kai who then sighed for relief. Flandre then took a small injection needle from her pocket and looked at it.

"I've seen Patchy using these. These are treated with chemical that prevents blood from coagulating." Flandre said and walked up to Kai.

"Now please, stretch your arm, this wont hurt." Flandre said to Kai who stretched his arm so Flandre could take a sample of his blood.

"So how did you and Marisa get to know eachother?" Kai asked from Flandre who looked for an artery from Kai's hand.

"It happened about fourteen years ago. My sister created that red mist which spread across the whole Gensokyo." Flandre said while accumulating a sample of Kai's blood.

"Oh, I remember that. I was just a small kid back when it happened." Kai responded wistful look on his face.

"Yep. After the incident was solved, my sister was visiting the Hakurei shrine. During that time, Marisa was visiting the mansion and she happened to run in to me. We had a battle and Marisa ended up winning. Before that, I treated Marisa like anyother toy, but after she won me in battle, she didn't shun me. She was being nice to me. It was the first time for almost five hundred years when I felt something else than sorrow, hate or urge to kill. I felt happiness." Flandre said with plaintive look on her face. Flandre had managed to acquire enough blood during her story. She then just watched the needle in her hands. She knew that she could now do it. She could revive her friend.

"I'm not sure how she will react when she wakes up, but I'd recommend you to be careful, she's still a vampire." Flandre said with serious tone and moved Marisa's lips a bit, so Kai could see the fangs in her mouth.

"Now please, stand back, I'll start the ritual." Flandre said with calm tone. And took the lantern out from her pocket. She then leaned closer to Marisa, took a deep breath and injected the blood staight to Marisa's veins. She then carefully opened the lantern and took the candle out. Then she touched Marisa's body with the burning candle and the whole body started to burn with those green and blue flames. The candle then stopped burning. Marisa's soul was now in her body, but the ritual wasn't over yet. Flandre the kneeled before Marisa, lowered her hand on to Marisa's forehead and started to chant some weird spell with closed eyes: "Ego os meum Orbis. Praeteritum est corpus meum, et sanguis meus vere est futura. Ego vivere in mille adipiscing. Quod Classical est. Non quidem, ut notum est. Tolerabilis dolor est creare fabulis. Qui mordent dentibus eorum, et non erit. Sicut et ego opera immoderatus historia." Flandre iterated the spell few times until Marisa started to glow. Flandre then stopped chanting, but kept her hand on top of Marisa's forehead. It took quiet a while, but then suddenly a shock wave of energy swept across the forest and Marisa's body stopped burning. Flandre then lifted her hand from on top of Marisa's forehead and backed away a little. They waited for few seconds, but then suddenly Marisa sat up with eyes wide open, took a deep breath and then collapsed back to the ground and kept breathing with wide open eyes. Flandre then stepped forward and looked at Marisa with enthused look on her face.

"D-did it work?" Kai asked carefully and took a few steps forward to see Marisa.

"Yes, yes it did!" Flandre responded with eyes sparkling with joy. She then turned towards Kai and hugged him.

"We did it! We finally did it!" Flandre yelled while clinging to Kai. She then let go of him with a bit shameful look on her face and apologized her spontaneous behaviour. Kai just smiled a bit even if he got freaked out a little.

"She will be fully recovered in under ten minutes." Flandre said and looked at Marisa with smile on her face. Kai then sat down beside Marisa and patted her hair. Marisa didn't react in any way. She just layed there and breathed heavily. Yana then took a few steps forward to take a better look at Marisa.

"So it's done?" Yana asked from smiling Flandre who was sitting beside Kai.

"Yes, it is. Isn't it wonderful?" Flandre responded and looked at Marisa joyful look on her face. They all just sat beside Marisa waiting for her to recover. After about ten minutes Flandre noticed how Marisa started to move her fingers. She then signed everyone to back away a little bit, so Marisa could have more breathing room. Then Marisa's arms and legs started to twitch indicating that she had started to reagain a control over her body. But then suddenly she stopped moving and just layed there. Flandre took a step closer to see what was going on, but before she could do that, Marisa suddenly stood up and dashed backwards about five meters. She just stood there, breathing heavily and looked at Yana, Kai and Flandre. Rumia stayed at the backround. She wasn't too interested about Marisa's revival.

"M-Marisa." Flandre said and took a step towards Marisa, but Marisa immediately backed away one step.

"Wh-what's wrong?" Flandre continued with confused look on her face.

"W-wasn't killing me once e-enough?" Marisa managed to stutter.

"Wh... No... I-I mean... We..." Flandre slurred in confusion, but she was interrupted quickly by Marisa: "You what? First I got turned in to a vampire, then I got abandoned by everyone and finally you helped my persecutors to find me and stick a knife in to my chest."

"I had no choice, you would have killed us all." Flandre tried to defend her actions with sad look on her face.

"Because you attacked me. No matter what I would have done, they would have still killed me, so what do you expect me to do. Just hand over myself so they could kill me without breaking a sweat?" Marisa said with blaming tone and tears grew to her eyes. She just turned around and sat down.

"I-I'm sorry. I missed you so much. I retrieved your soul from hell and managed to revive you, so after all this, I don't want to be enemies with you." Flandre said with sad look on her face and took a step closer to Marisa.

"I know... Sigh* But I'm just worried that this will just lead us to another slaughter. Besides, what do you think will happen when Yukari and the others will get to know about this?" Marisa said and looked at Flandre with depressed look on her face.

"We'll find a way to turn you back. No matter what it will take, I promise, I wont let you down on this." Flandre said with determined look on her face.

"But Patchy said that this becomes irreversible when you drink blood. Hey, how is Sanae doing? Don't tel me that she is, you know..." Marisa said with worried tone.

"No, she is alive. She recovered after few days." Flandre answered and walked closer to Marisa.

"Good to hear that I didn't kill everyone. Sigh*" Marisa said and cracked a sad smile on to her face.

"Marisa, I think that here's someone who wants to meet you." Flandre said with gentle smile on her face. Marisa then turned around again in confusion. She hadn't recognized her brother at first. Kai then took a few steps forward and said to Marisa: "Hi. It feels strange to introduce myself to my own sister, but I think that you never got to know my name. My name is Kai." Marisa then took a few steps forward to take a better look at her brother. Marisa gently touched her younger brother's cheek with unbelieving look on her face.

"Wh-why did you help her to revive me, after I almost shot you and father?" Marisa said with unbelieving and confused look on her face.

"Dad treated you badly. You didn't deserve that kind of treatment. Vampire or not, you're still my sister and I want to get to know you." Kai said with gentle smile on his face. He then grabbed Marisa's hand gently and hugged her.

"Thanks." Marisa said and a few tears of joy grew to her eyes. Kai then let go of Marisa and they sat down. Yana too walked beside Marisa. Marisa, Flandre, Kai and Yana talked almost through the whole night. About good old times, youkai hunting, past incidents and Marisa's family. They even laughed a bit from time to time. Marisa was happy when she heard that her mother hadn't held a grudge towards her after she had left home, or atleast Kai hadn't noticed that she did. Yana too was happy to have a coversation with his idol. Marisa taught him a few tips and tricks to become a youkai hunter some day. Marisa thought that it was good to hear that at least someone was going to protect the humans in the future. Flandre stayed mostly silent, so Marisa could get to know her brother without getting interrupted all the time. It was 4 am when they finally noticed how long they had been sitting there. Marisa then noticed how her thirst for blood had returned, but she didn't want to make too big re-mark about it, so that Kai and Yana wouldn't get too scared. She told them that it had returned and that they shouldn't get too close to her because of that. But she told that it hadn't grown too much, so it wouldn't bother her. Kai offered that Marisa could drink a little bit of his blood, but Marisa refused. She didn't want to accidentally hurt her brother. Flandre then stood up and said to Kai and Yana: "The sun is about to rise. Me and Rumia will carry you back to the village now. Thank you so much for your help." Flandre then bowed for Kai and Yana with joyful smile on her face.

"No, thank you. Without you I would have never gotten to know my sister." Kai responded and bowed back at Flandre. Yana did the same.

"So what are you going to do now?" Kai asked from Flandre who helped Marisa to stand up.

"It is going to be risky, but the only place where she can stay is the Scarlet Devil Mansion. I just have hide her somehow. We'll try to find a way to turn her back to human and then we'll tell everyone about this and get them to understand." Flandre said with smiling and determined look on her face.

"So I think that I'm not going to see you for a while, I assume. Best of luck to you both. And remember, if you need any kind of help, you just need to ask." Kai said with joyful smile on his face.

"Thank you. I'll keep that in mind. Now Marisa, you just stay here and wait for me to return. Me and Rumia will carry Kai and Yana back to the human village." Flandre said to Marisa who just calmly nodded to indicate that she understood. Marisa then waved a good-bye for Kai and Yana as Flandre and Rumia grabbed gently from their vaists, took off and disappeared into distance. She just wondered, how everyone were going to react when they would get to know that she had been revived. She was afraid that they would not forgive her and they would try to kill her, but Marisa just tried to not to think about it. Marisa looked to her right and saw the gravestone with her name on it.

"If they got me out from there, I wont let them down on this." She thought to herself with determined look on her face. After almost an hour, Flandre finally returned to Marisa and landed before her.

"They got safely home. Now shall we get to the mansion before the sun rises." Flandre asked with gentle smile on her face.

"Yeah, okay. Where will I hide when we get to there?" Marisa asked after she stood up.

"Only possible place that I can think of is either my current room or the room that I was trapped in for almost 500 years and I think that you don't want to stay there, so I think that my room is the only solution." Flandre said after thinking for few seconds.

"Okay, how are we going to sneak in without being noticed?" Marisa continued with worried tone.

"Don't really know. We just have to find a way, but come on, we have to move. The sun is about to rise." Flandre said and signed Marisa to follow her. They took off from the ground and headed towards the Scarlet Devil Mansion.

"So what are we going to do if we get caught?" Marisa asked with worried tone while they were flying towards the mansion.

"Let's just hope for the best. Honestly I don't have any idea what we're going to do, if we get caught." Flandre responded. Her comment didn't make Marisa feel any better, but she knew that they had no choice. They soon arrived to the mansion's western side wall. They landed before it. Flandre signed that she was going to fly over and see if the coast was clear. After ten seconds Flandre came back and signed that it was safe. Marisa quickly flew over the wall and landed to the garden. They looked around themselves. It looked like that Meiling was once again sleeping in front of the main gate. The sun was about to rise and the sky was turning orangish. They sneaked through the garden and when they reached the mansion they looked around themselves again. There was nobody in the vicinity them so they continued. Flandre went for the closest iron window and opened it. The window lead to long and dark corridor. Flandre sighed for relief when she saw nobody in the corridor. She then turned towards Marisa, nodded to indicate that it was all clear and then jumped through the window and Marisa followed.

"Where now?" Marisa whispered with nervous tone.

"Follow me. The staircase leading to the basement is just around the corner." Flandre responded and and started to walk deeper in to the mansion. They both tried to be as silent as possible. It was that time in the morning when Remilia was going to sleep, so most of the anttention had been turned towards her room. They didn't encouner even a single fairy maid on their way to the staircase. Flandre then quickly opened the door leading to the basement and they headed in. Flandre sighed for relief when they entered the staircase. It wasn't too long till they reached Flandre's room and as soon as they did, Flandre opened the door and they slipped in. Flandre closed the door behind them and sighed for relief.

"We made. Phew*" Flandre said with relieved smile on her face.

"You've got nice room." Marisa said after looking around herself. Flandre then walked up to her drawer and pulled out a metallic bottle and few tea cups. She then gave the other cup to Marisa and poured some blood from that bottle to Marisa's cup.

"I have this bottle for incase I wake up in the middle of the day and feel need to drink." Flandre said and poured some blood to her cup.

"Go on. You need to drink much more often than I do." Flandre exhorted Marisa to drink with caring tone.

"I still don't get it. Why does the thirst return so quickly even after when I have fed?" Marisa asked while looking at the blood in her cup before drinking it.

"Huh? You don't know? It's because you waited for four days before drinking blood the first time. If you had drank blood immediately, you could last for weeks without feeling any kind of thirst. And because I was born as a vampire, I can last for over a month without feeling need to drink blood." Flandre explained while drinking blood from her cup.

"Sigh* So we can't do anything about that. So, do you have any idea about how are we gonna cure my vampirism?" Marisa asked after she had finished her blood.

"Well Patchouli didn't seem to believe that there is any way to cure it, so she isn't going to be any use for us. Would you happen to know any person in Gensokyo, who would have had any contact or knowledge about vampires? I hate to say it, but even if I am a vampire, I don't have any idea how you can cure yourself from it." Flandre said with a bit shameful smile on her face.

"Well, if I remember correctly, Yuuka had this vampire subordinate, but your sister killed her after you arrived to Gensokyo." Marisa said after thinking for a while.

"What? Why would she do that?" Flandre asked with a bit shocked tone.

"No idea. But I think that Yuuka could know something about vampirism. Also we could try Eirin. As far as I know, Eirin is able to create any kind of medicine or elixir. Maybe she could help us." Marisa continued and rubbed her chin.

"Well those are most likely our best changes. So when are you ready to get going?" Flandre asked after Marisa told her thoughts about who they should ask help from.

"Wh-what do you mean 'you'?" Marisa asked with a bit confused tone.

"You know that we can't hide you forever. Yuuka is one of those who will see through all our lies, so it is the easiest way to just go straight up to her with the two of us. She really doesn't care about balance of Gensokyo and she's sadist anyway, so I bet that she wont give a single shit that you have been revived. With Eirin we can do otherwise. She's so arrogant with her knowledge about medicines, that I'm sure that I can persuade her to help me. I bet that she'll just see the creation of 'vampirism cure' as a challenge." Flandre said with assertive look on her face.

"Sigh* You may be right. But what are we going to do, if Yuuka decides to tell everyone?" Marisa asked with worried tone.

"Let's just hope for the best. If it comes to that, we'll stop her before she can do so. But if everyone gets to know about it too early, we just have to somehow explain it to them." Flandre responded with insecure tone.

"Not very convincing..." Marisa said and chuckled nervously.

"Hey, Flan. Have you ever thought about cure?" Marisa suddenly asked and turned towards Flandre who was sitting next to her on her bed.

"What do you mean?" Flandre asked with confused look on her face.

"I meant that, if Eirin manages to create a cure for vampirism, would you use it?" Marisa asked with curious tone.

"I-I've never thought about it." Flandre said after hesitating for a moment.

"I don't even know, if it would work on me, beacause I've been vampire for my whole life. I don't know if there is a human side for me at all." Flandre continued with serious tone.

"But you could try. Think about it, you could feel sun and rain on your skin without feeling pain." Marisa said with convincing tone.

"I don't really know. I think that we shouldn't play around with these kinds of things. Switching between humanity and vampirism isn't like changing your outfit." Flandre continued with serious tone.

"I know, I know, but think about it. There could be a real human hidden under that vampire." Marisa continued with a bit enthused tone.

"I know what you mean but... Sigh* I just don't think that it would be worth the risk." Flandre said with a bit apologizing tone.

"Well I don't want force you to do it. I just wanted to hear, if you had ever thought about it." Marisa said and cracked a gentle smile. But then suddenly Flandre stood up and walked up to the door of her room. She pressed her ear against the door and stayed silent for few seconds.

"W-what wrong?" Marisa asked with confused tone. Flandre then turned towards Marisa and whispered quickly: "Quick hide, someone is coming!" Marisa then immediately got off from the bed and dashed under it. Flandre then went and sat on to her bed and tried to look as casual as she could. The door opened and Meiling stepped inside. Flandre tilted her head like asking, what Meiling was doing there. Meiling then came forth and sat beside Flandre.

"You remember what I said about you, that I felt Marisa's Qi?" Meiling started with serious tone.

"Yeah, what about it?" Flandre responded with unamused tone.

"Well, I feel it now more clearly than last time. Sigh* Try to understand this, could it be possible that Marisa's ghost is here, in your room." Meiling said with uneasy look on her face. Flandre just kept looking at Meiling with really unamused look on her face.

"I didn't mean to upset you in anyway. I know how important she was to you and maybe... I don't know... maybe she stayed here with you." Meiling tried to comfort Flandre, but Flandre just glared at Meiling with pissed look. Meiling then sighed, stood up and walked to the door. Before stepping out, Meiling turned towards Flandre with apologizing look on her face and bowed for Flandre. She then shut the door behind her and left the basement. Flandre then sighed for relief. And looked under the bed. Marisa just layed there with her eyes glowing in the dark.

"Well Meiling didn't get it all wrong." Flandre said and grinned mischeviously as she helped Marisa to get out from under the bed.

"That was too close. We have to get going pretty soon or they will realize that I'm not just a ghost." Marisa said with serious tone while shaking some dust off from her sleeves. Flandre just stood there and thought for moment.

"What's in your mind?" Marisa asked with curious look on her face and crossed her arms over her chest.

"I got an idea. You're right about that you can't stay here for too long, but before we get moving, I want to play a little prank on Meiling." Flandre said and made cunning grinn.

"I'm all ears." Marisa said and watched as Flandre walked up to her drawer. Flandre rummaged the contents of that drawer for a while until she pulled out a knife and snapped its blade off.

"Meiling seems to think that you're just a ghost that is haunting the mansion, so how about we 'prove' her supposition right?" Flandre said and grinned mischeviously. Marisa soon realized what Flandre meant and she too grinned.

"We'll startle the living hell out of her." Marisa responded to Flandre who was looking at the knife handle in her hands.

"Okay we'll do this: first we'll make you to look like a ghost. Then I'll go to eat some supper and you'll go to wait in to that dungeon where I used to be trapped. I'll tell Meiling to go to my room and get the used cups from there. She'll definetly sense your presence and investigate. If or when she enters the dungeon, you'll scare the shit out of her. It's risky, but it'll be worth it." Flandre explained her plan with enthused tone. Marisa nodded to indicate that she understood the plan.

"So how are we going to mask me to look like a ghost?" Marisa asked and grinned.

"Simple really, we'll just attach this knife handle to your chest to look like that you've been stabbed. After that we'll add some blood to your hands, chest and some blood to your face to look like it's dripping from your mouth." Flandre explained and took that metallic blood bottle out from the drawer. Flandre then walked up to Marisa and pressed that knife handle against Marisa's chest. It reminded her too much about the events about four weeks ago, so she just looked away. Marisa then took a hold of the handle and attached it to her chest, so it would look like she was stabbed.

"Pretty convincing I'd say." Marisa said and inspected herself. Flandre then opened the bottle of blood and gave it to Marisa. She then poured some to her hands and shirt to make it look like that the wound on her chest was bleeding. She then poured some in to her mouth and then let it trickle over her lips to make it look like she was bleeding from her mouth. She then swallowed the rest and looked at Flandre.

"How does it look?" Marisa asked and looked at Flandre with wide smile on her face.

"Looks like the Hell spat you out." Flandre said and grinned mischeviously. She then walked up to the door and signed Marisa to follow her. They walked through the door and turned to their left which lead to staircase that lead to the deepest part of the basement. They walked down the stairs until they reached a big opening in front of them. On the back wall there was that door which led to the dungeon where Flandre had been trapped for almost 500 years. Flandre then walked up to the door and Marisa followed her.

"It has been fourteen years since I last visited this room." Marisa said while looking at the stone door with crossed arms. Flandre just nodded with serious look on her face as she opened the door to ajar with some spell.

"If this doesn't catch her attention, I don't know what will." Flandre said and made a determined smile to her face.

"Now, you'll go in there, I'll leave this door like this and go up to send Meiling to take care of my room. She'll be sure to notice your presence once again. When she enters this room, you know what to do." Flandre said to Marisa who nodded to indicate that she understood. Flandre then just nodded, took off from the floor and flew upstairs. Marisa then just stepped inside to this so called 'room'. She looked around herself. She had almost forgotten how ominous and threatening the room was. Those stalagmites and those vague and stony walls with bloody paintings on them made Marisa to feel very nervous. Marisa then walked up to the menacing looking bed in the middle of the room and sat down on it. She then suddenly heard some rustling when she sat down. She stood up and looked, what was under the blanket. When she removed the blanket, she found a pile of really old looking papers that had some really disturbing writing on them and some really creepy drawings. All of it was made with blood.

"Kill Remilia, kill Remilia, kill Remilia, kill Remilia, kill Remilia... Revenge! One for sorrow, two for joy. Three for girl, four for boy. Five for silver, six for gold. And seven for secret never to be told. I'm here, I'm here, I'm here..." Marisa thought to herself while reading through the writing on the papers. She then looked at the drawings. Most of them pictured a pile of corpses and one figure standing in the middle of them. The figure had really creepy looking empty eyes without any other facial features. Marisa then put the papers back to their place and placed the blanket over them like it had been when she found them.

"I knew that Flandre was in really bad condition when I met her first time, but damn..." Marisa thought to herself with empty look on her eyes. Flandre had told Marisa that she had fixed the relationship between her and Remilia when they were talking after they had revived Marisa, but Marisa had never guessed how bad the situation really was. Suddenly Marisa heard some steps from the outside. She knew that it was Meiling. She readied herself and turned around from the door for better impact. Meiling had sensend Marisa's presence again and decided to investigate it this time when Flandre wasn't there. When Meiling reached the bottom layer of the basement she gulped when she saw the door of that dungeon ajar. Meiling had never before visited that room and to see it slightly open with no apparent reason made her feeling very uncomfortable.

"I-is someone there?" Meiling yelled with nervous tone, but she heard no response. She still felt Marisa's Qi, so she gulped again and walked closer. She took a peek inside, but didn't see anyone. Marisa was standing just barely out of Meiling's sight. Meiling then stepped carefully inside and looked around herself. Then she noticed Marisa standing slightly to her right with her back turned towards Meiling. Marisa then slowly turned around and started to breath heavily. Meiling was paralyzed from the shock when she saw all the blood and spittle that was dripping from Marisa's mouth, her bloodied hands and worst of all that knife handle that was pointing from her chest.

"You had faith in me, didn't you?" Marisa hissed from between her teeth and made a really sinister looking grinn to her face, so Meiling could see her bloody fangs.

"A-a-a..." Meiling tried to stutter as she pointed at Maria and slowly backed away.

"AAAAAAAAHH!" Meiling screamed when she finally turned around and started running upstairs. Marisa couldn't control herself and bursted out laughing. But she soon stopped because she knew that Meiling was going to inform everyone else, so she needed to get back in to Flandre's room and hide in there. She then quickly took off and flew up the stairs until she reached Flandre's room. She quickly opened the door, dashed inside and closed the door behind her. She then hid under the bed incase someone entered Flandre's room. She just layed there and waited. She thought that Meiling's reaction was priceless. She soon heard some movement otside the room and some mumbling. She then heard the door opening and saw how someone stepped inside. She held her breath because she couldn't tell who it was. The person closed the door behind her and whispered: "Marisa? You here?" It was Flandre. Marisa sighed for relief and responded: "Yep, I'm here." She then peeked from under the bed. Flandre just watched as Marisa's head grinned mischeviously from under the bed.

"Perfect." Flandre said and grinned back at Marisa.

"Now they'll think that you actully are just a ghost. However, we have to move fast. I don't know how long they'll think that you're just a restless spirit." Flandre said and the grinn on her face turned to seriousness.

"You're right. We'll wait for this day and then we'll get going." Marisa said and nodded to Flandre.

"No, we'll get going as soon as they go to sleep. We have better odds to get out of here without being noticed in day. We'll travel to your house and wait for the day to pass there." Flandre said with serious and convincing look on her face.

"Yeah, you may be right." Marisa responded after she got out from under the bed.

"How long till they go to sleep?" Marisa asked while tidying her clothes and skin from blood.

"Shouldn't take more than half hour." Flandre said and shrugged her shoulders. She then once again walked up to her drawer. She started look for things that they could possibly need when they go out. She grabbed two parasols and that bottle of blood, for they had to manage Marisa's bloodlust somehow. They just sat on top of Flandre's bed and waited. They heard some mumbling from the outside when Meiling and the others returned from the lower basement, though they couldn't hear what meiling and the others were talking about. They waited for twenty minutes in complete silence to make sure that they were left alone and everybody had gone to sleep. Flandre then looked at Marisa and signed that she was going to go and check, if everyone had gone to sleep. She then stood up and turned in to a bat. Marisa opened the door a bit so Flandre could slip out. Marisa then closed the door after Flandre had gone out. Marisa just simply waited for five minutes until Flandre returned. She opened the door and silently signed to Marisa that it was clear. Marisa then grabbed the parasols and the bottle, stood up and walked up to Flandre.

"Everyone had gone to sleep. We must move now." Flandre whispered with serious face. Marisa just nodded and they walked upstairs. When they reached the ground level, they headed towards the closest window. It took a minute or two, but finally they reached the outside wall. Marisa the opened the parasols and gave the other to Flandre. Flandre then nodded to Marisa to indicate that she was ready. Marisa then just nodded back at her and reached for the metal-covered window. She opened it as quietly as possible and blocked the sun rays with her parasol. They then jumped out from the window as carefully as they possibly could.

"We'll have to take a detour or Meiling might see us, well assuming that she isn't sleeping like usual." Flandre said and signed that they should fly in a vast circular trajectory from the west side side of the mansion. Marisa nodded and they took off. It was risky to fly a such a long way during the day, but it was so early in the morning that there shouldn't be too many youkai or fairies around this time. But even if it still was morning, there always was a chance that they could be seen and if that happens, they could be in a real trouble.

They flew to the west side of the Misty Lake before heading to east towards the Forest of Magic. This way there was a lesser chance that they would encounter anyone. The journey was long and the sun felt uncomfortable even with parasols, but eventually, they reached the forest which offered more shadows and made Marisa and Flandre to feel a bit more comfortable. It was half past ten when they finally reached Marisa's house. They were lucky that they had been able to avoid all the fairies and youkai on their way there.

When they reached the yard, Marisa just watched her deserted house with plaintive look on her face.

"I assume that my house is completely empty by now." Marisa said while they were walking towards her house.

"Yes your house was cleared in a single day." Flandre responded when they reached the terrace. They then closed their parasols and stepped inside.

"I thought as much." Marisa muttered when she stepped inside and looked around herself.

"Let's go upstairs. My room is there." Marisa said and looked at Flandre. They then headed to upstairs through narrow staircase. Marisa then swiped some dust from the door handle before opening the door.

"Home sweet home." Marisa mumbled while looking around her room. It seemed that it had been untouched since the day she drank Sanae's blood. She didn't store the stolen items in her room so no one had entered it. Flandre then walked up to Marisa's bed and sat on it. She left the blood bottle on top of Marisa's nightstand and the parasols leaning against it.

"A-ha! Here's mah' baby!" Marisa yelled when she finally found her broom from the corner of the room.

"Did you miss me? Because I missed you. You really could come in handy." Marisa enthused while shaking some dust off from the broom. She then looked through her drawer.

"Even my old immortality elixir blueprints are still here..." Marisa muttered with a little bit sadder tone. She then put the papers back to drawer and closed it.

"Okay, we should get some sleep before heading towards the Garden of the Su-" Marisa said while looking at her drawer with empty look on her eyes, but she stopped when she turned around. Flandre had already fallen asleep and just snuffled on Marisa's bed adorably. Marisa then cracked a gentle smile and sat beside Flandre. Marisa bed wasn't meant for two people, but she managed to squeeze herself beside Flandre. Marisa then looked at sleeping Flandre with a gentle smile and patted her hair.

"Good night... mommy." Marisa whispered and chuckled a bit. She then improved her position a bit and she too fell asleep.

To be continued...


End file.
